Story By: Alex Cope, Sub Editor: Joseph Golder, Agency: Central European News
Seventy-five prisoners have broken free from a Paraguayan jail in a prison break which saw dozens of members of Brazil’s largest gang escape using a tunnel.
The prisoners, the majority of whom belong to the Brazilian gang Primer Comando Capital (First Capital Command (PCC), escaped from the Pedro Juan Caballero prison in the city of Pedro Juan Caballero in the eastern Paraguayan department of Amambay near the border with Brazil.
The authorities have since reportedly found a tunnel which they believe was used in the escape.
The tunnel was carefully hidden to avoid detection but despite that the Minister of Justice, Cecilia Perez, told reporters: “This was not the work of one man alone and was not done in a day, it is impossible that nobody knew anything, it cannot be that nobody saw anything.”
Images show a prison cell packed with bags of dirt reportedly excavated in the digging of the tunnel. Some reports state 91 prisoners participated in the escape but 16 of them were captured as they were leaving the tunnel.
The authorities are not ruling out the possibility that many of the missing prisoners may also have walked out of the prison’s main exit with the complicity of the guards.
The Director of the prison, Christan Gonzalez, along with the security chiefs of the facility, have been fired and arrested according to reports.
Local media report the Public Ministry suspect that prison staff may have participated in the prison break and at least 28 prison guards have been detained with prosecutor Reinalda Palacios saying “they will all be investigated and there could be more arrested”.
Palacios confirmed 50 prisoners from the prison’s upper floor and 25 from the lower floor escaped in the incident.
The PCC is considered the largest drug and arms trafficking gang in Brazil and reports state five pickup trucks used by the prison breakers were found burnt out in Ponta Pora on the Brazilian side of the border.
Paraguay’s National Police have launched a hunt for the escapees among who are inmates who participated in a massacre which left 10 inmates dead in the prison on 16th June 2019.
The Brazilian authorities in the state of Mato Grosso do Sul have issued an alert with state police and the armed forces working in the area to try to arrest the fugitives.
The investigation into the incident and the search for the prison breakers is ongoing.
The ViralTab page is created by and dedicated to professional, independent freelance journalists. It is a place for us to showcase our work. When our news is sold to our media partners, we will include the link here.
