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This Sunday the Ciudad Juárez prison, located on the border with the US city of El Paso, in Texas, was the target of an attack by Mexican cartels. The balance: some 25 people managed to escape while 17 died in the events, ten of them prison guards.
The attack against the state prison, Center for Social Reintegration (Cereso), on the border Ciudad Juárez, in Mexico, left at least 17 dead, according to the latest report from the authorities. Security Secretary Rosa Icela Rodríguez said 10 of those killed were prison guards.
The prison was stormed on Sunday, January 1, by armed men who arrived in armored vehicles and shot from the entrance to the dormitories. After the operation, 25 inmates escaped.
The Mexican authorities retook control of the prison five hours after the start of the violent actions. To recover it, members of the militarized National Guard and the Army entered.
An operation was also launched to find the escaped prisoners. Five people outside the prison have been arrested, accused of being related to the attack.
The soldiers and the police, upon retaking control of the prison, found 10 “VIP” cells equipped with televisions and 84 cell phones, prohibited in Mexican prisons. In one of them there was even a safe with 1,702,174 Mexican pesos, about 87,290 dollars, according to the Secretary of National Defense of Mexico, Luis Cresencio Sandoval.
They also seized 17 long weapons, five short weapons, eight tactical vests, four vehicles and a grenade launcher attachment.
Authorities also found eight fentanyl pills, 40 grams of cocaine, 1.5 kilos of heroin, four kilos of crystal, and 16.2 kilos of marijuana inside the prison.
Sandoval said an attack on local police, where two of the attackers were killed, was possibly a diversion.
Members of the band ‘Los Mexicles’ flee
Rosa Icela Rodríguez identified the convicts who managed to escape as members of the ‘Los Mexicles’ gang, among them was the leader, Ernesto Piñón, known as ‘El Neto’.
This man is accused by the authorities of ordering acts of violence within this same prison in August, events that left at least two inmates murdered and more than twenty injured, mainly against members of the criminal group ‘Los Chapos’.
After this event, members of a gang started a shootout in the city and in the shooting they killed four employees of a radio station who were doing a promotion in a restaurant.
Previously, “El Neto” had already escaped in 2009, when he was transferred to a Mexican court and later, he was recaptured and sentenced in 2015.
According to the secretary, the Mexicles are associated with the Caborca cartel. ‘Los Mexicles’ are one of the main gangs in Juárez and for a long time the authorities knew that they worked with the Sinaloa Cartel.
The Caborca cartel had been led by drug trafficker Rafael Caro Quintero, recaptured in July.
Violence is frequent in Mexican prisons. Clashes regularly break out between inmates from rival gangs, who in places like Juárez act as proxies for drug cartels.
With EFE and AP
