RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) – Twenty-seven inmates have died in eruptions of violence in two northern Brazilian prisons, officials said Sunday as they quelled the latest in a string of prison disturbances across the country in which more than 100 people have died within two weeks.
State security officials said fighting between rival gangs broke out Saturday at the adjacent Alcacuz and Rogerio Coutinho lockups near the city of Natal in the Rio Grande do Norte state.
Officials waited until dawn Sunday before entering to try to re-impose control, said state security chief Caio Cesar Bezerra.
“This way we guaranteed a calm intervention, a pacific intervention without resistance from the inmates,” Bezerra said.
President Michel Temer expressed concern over the rebellion Sunday through his official Twitter page, saying he had been following the situation closely.