CROIX-DES-BOUQUETS, Haiti (AP) – A prison director was among at least eight people killed on Thursday after several detainees tried to escape from a prison in the Haitian capital, a police officer and witnesses said.
The incident took place in northeastern Port-au-Prince at the Croix-des-Bouquets civil prison, which was built by Canada in 2012 and is known for a 2014 outbreak in which more than 300 detainees escaped.
Residents in the area who refused to be identified out of concern for their safety told The Associated Press that they noticed a group of heavily armed men begin firing on prison guards before detainees began to flee.
Shots could still be heard inside the prison a few hours after the shooting began.
The police officer who confirmed the murder of the prison director to the PA and refused to be identified because he was not allowed to speak to the media, said authorities were preparing to raid the prison and described the detainees as armed and dangerous.
At the time of the 2014 outbreak, the prison had 899 detainees, about 130 above its capacity.
During Thursday’s incident, a 37-year-old fugitive, Jhon Hippolyte, was shot in the back. He told the AP that he was serving a sentence for murder and was in the infirmary when he noticed that everyone was running away and decided to join them.
AP journalists saw the bodies of at least seven men along the streets near the prison. They had been shot. Their identities were not immediately available and it was unclear whether they were detained or who had killed them.
The video captured by residents shows a police officer leading a group of men tied together with a rope. It was not immediately clear if they were detainees.
Authorities could not be reached for comment immediately.