A riot was reported on Monday at the
juvenile detention facility of Bari, in the Puglia region.
Prison guards reported a brawl between inmates who then turned
against penitentiary police officers, slapping and punching
them.
Nobody was injured and the situation has returned to normal,
sources at the detention facility said.
The incident followed riots recorded over the past few weeks at
juvenile prisons in Rome, Turin and Milan.
In the latest episode, inmates at Milan's Beccaria prison in the
night between Saturday and Sunday set mattresses on fire to
create chaos and enable detainees to attempt an evasion,
prompting the intervention of firefighters.
Four detainees who tried to evade were found by police on the
building's roof a few hours after the riot began and eight
detainees and police officers were injured, none of them
seriously.
Citing the latest incidents, the leaders of prison officers'
unions Sappe and Cosp spoke about an "emergency" in juvenile
detention facilities, often plagued by overcrowding.
"Let's ask ourselves whether this is a form of dissent or
whether someone decides to acknowledge that we are dealing with
an emergency", Domenico Mastrulli, leader of Cosp, said on
Monday.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED © Copyright ANSA
