Editor’s Note: This article is part of an ongoing series on prison conditions and criminal justice policy around the world. Dozens of inmates were killed in a wave of violence that swept across Honduran prisons in recent weeks, as rival gangs staged a series of bloody riots and retaliatory attacks against each other. The country’s penal system has a long history of gang-driven violence, but the recent killings represent a notable uptick, says Eric L. Olson, director of policy at the Seattle International Foundation and a global fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. In an email interview [...]
Editor’s Note: This article is part of a new series on prison conditions and criminal justice policy around the world. Sixty-two people are dead following a riot at a prison in northern Brazil earlier this week. Fifty-eight inmates were killed when a fight broke out between rival gangs at a prison in Altamira, in Para state, including 16 who were beheaded. Four more inmates were murdered while being transferred to a different facility. In an email interview with WPR, Robert Muggah, co-founder and research director at the Igarape Institute in Rio de Janeiro, explains why deadly prison riots are so [...]
