UATEMALA CITY, (Reuters) – Guatemala issued arrest warrants for 16 people yesterday, including former senior government officials and a presidential candidate, over the 2006 storming of a prison that left seven inmates dead.
Five ex police officers charged with extrajudicial killings were arrested, but the other 11 people wanted were not caught.
The fugitives include a former prison director who ran for president in 2007, as well as the interior minister and the attorney general at the time of the incident.
Seven prisoners were killed when security forces stormed the El Pavon jail south of Guatemala City in September 2006 to regain control of the facility from street gangs who had been running extortion rackets from behind bars for years.
Criminal leaders held in Guatemalan prisons are believed to control their syndicates from their cells.
