HONDURAS JAIL FIRE CLAIMS 357 LIVES

TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras - A massive fire swept through an overcrowded prison in Honduras and killed more than 350 inmates, including many trapped inside their cells, officials said yesterday.
The attorney general's office said 357 people died in the blaze that began late on Tuesday night at the prison in Comayagua, about 75 kilometres north of the capital Tegucigalpa. Radio reports said the dead and missing totalled 402 people — almost half the prison's inmates.

• Lucy Marder, head of forensic services in Comayagua, said police reported that one of the dead was a woman who stayed overnight and the rest were prisoners, but she said some of the 357 presumed dead could have escaped. Local media reported that the Comayagua fire department chief also died in the blaze.
• It was one of the worst prison fires ever in Latin America, and local radio reports said many of the inmates were burned to death inside their cells.
• Honduras has the highest murder rate in the world, according to the United Nations, and there are frequent riots and clashes between members of rival street gangs in its overcrowded prisons.
• Soldiers, police and anxious relatives surrounded the prison yesterday morning and television images showed weeping relatives pressed against a chain link fence as they waited for news.
• Some relatives began throwing rocks at police and tried to force their way into the prison. Police responded by firing shots into the air and tear gas at the protesters, who were mostly women.

The prison housed more than 800 inmates — well above its capacity.
"This is desperate, they won't tell us anything and I think my husband is dead," a crying Gregoria Zelaya told Canal 5 TV as she stood outside the prison.
Local firemen said they were prevented from entering the prison due to gunshots. But Daniel Orellana, head of the prison system, said there was no riot.
"We have two hypotheses, one is that a prisoner set fire to a mattress and the other one is that there was a short circuit in the electrical system," he said.

Source: Agency