Beheaded, burnt bodies: Remains of a drug-fuelled prison war

In Brazil, Manaus a shocking incident came to light on the first day of the year.

Late on January 1, 2017  violence erupted in a prison in Manaus, Amazon. The situation was only brought under control on January 2, 2017.

Vans of the Legal Medicine Institute carrying bodies of inmates killed during a riot, leave the Anisio Jobim Penitentiary Complex (Compaj) in Manaus, Amazonia, Brazil, on January 2, 2017. At least 60 people were killed in a prison riot in Brazil's Amazon region when fighting broke out between rival gangs. / AFP / Jair Araujo

 

What transpired within the walls of the Brazilian prison is one that will send shivers down your spine. Manaus became the war zone for two prison gangs that were aiming to wrestle control over the drug trade in the region. It left 56 prisoners dead, dismembered and burnt. Six prisoners bodies with their head decapitated were thrown out of the prison by the wall.

 

This Sunday riot was the most deadliest one in the past few years. Officials have related it to the 1992 rebellion at the Carandiru prison in Sao Paulo state, which saw 111 inmates killed, nearly all of them by police retaking the jail.

 

The issue of supremacy had been a simmering issue between the two gangs for quite some time and finally on January 1, the issue took a deadly turn. The Family of the North is learnt to have massacred the rival PCC gang.

 

PM militarised police officers collect the bodies of inmates killed during a riot at the Anisio Jobim Penitentiary Complex. MARCIO SILVA/AFP/Getty Images

 

According to a report in the New York Times, prison authorities said that one of the gangs, Familia do Norte (Family of the North), which operates from the Manaus prisons, was responsible for a lot of the killings. Their targets were the First Capital Command, a much larger rival gang commonly known as the P.C.C., which has its roots in the prisons of São Paulo in southeast Brazil.

 

In this instance, a group of prisoners exchanged gunfire with police and held 12 employees of Umanizzare, a private contractor that operates prisons in the Amazon hostage. Several other prisoners were also held hostage. Eventually the situation was tamed after the rebels were assured that they would not be transferred to other prisons.

 

The incident turned deadly not only because of the history behind it but also because of the problem of intense overcrowding of the prison. Some of the prisoners staged a mass escape to distract the prison guards. The Anisio Jobim prison complex houses 2,230 inmates despite having a capacity of only 590. And in such close proximity, with simmering tempers, cramped quarters riots can take a deadly turn.

 

Relatives of inmates ask for information at the main gate of the Anisio Jobim Penitentiary Complex 

 

Father Valdir Silveira, director of Pastoral Carceraria, a Catholic center that monitors prison conditions in Brazil spoke to Reuters on this incident, "These massacres occur almost daily in Brazil. Our prisons were built to annihilate, torture and kill."

 

A total of 184 inmates escaped, with 40 recaptured by Monday afternoon. Now analysts fear that since these two gangs are housed in several prisons across the state, riots can be expected in other places as well. This incident has set a dangerous precedent.