Argentina: Let's Kill These Dogs

Palm trees and well-tended flower beds brighten the grounds of the four grey stone and concrete buildings of Villa Devoto Detention Institute in Buenos Aires. But the facade hides a multitude of sins and sinners: inside, Villa Devoto is the darkest penal hellhole in all Argentina.

The prison has a rated capacity of only 800 prisoners, but the filthy cells are crammed with 2,180 men. Some have been waiting three years for their cases to come to trial. At noon one day last week, discontent in Villa Devoto reached the flash point. Attempting a mass breakout, 400 prisoners seized 20 guards as hostages and demanded freedom.

When prison officials called in a force of 200 machine gun-toting cops to reinforce the regular guards, the prisoners in their high, fourth-tier redoubt began to shoot their hostages, one by one, to "dramatize" their demand. Two of 'the bodies were hurled from a window to the cops and guards in the courtyard below.

At 6 p.m., a federal judge entered the prison, hoping to arrange a truce. He returned to report that 13 hostages (a figure later proved erroneous) were already dead. By nightfall, the guards outside were uncontrollable in their fury. Prison officials pleaded with them not to attack the cell block. Instead, the guards mutinied. "Let's go, let's kill these dogs," cried a guard, and nearly 100 men charged the cellblock, bayoneting and shooting the massed prisoners. When the twelve-hour bloodbath ended, the toll stood at nine guards and 15 prisoners dead, another 25 wounded.