Four Guatemalan Police Killed In Prison

Four Guatemalan police officers were killed Sunday in prison while under arrest in the grisly killings last week of three Salvadoran politicians, police said.

Suspects Luis Arturo Herrera, head of the Guatemalan National Police organized crime unit, and three of his officers were killed at the jail in Cuilapa, 70 kilometers east of Guatemala City.

"It's confirmed, they killed the four of them, we don't know how," national police spokesman Maria Jose Fernandez said.

Riot police gathered outside the prison, as the warden and other prison officials were being held hostage in rebellion by prisoners.

On Feb. 19, assailants abducted and killed Eduardo D'Aubuisson — son of El Salvador's late right-wing leader Roberto D'Aubuisson — two other Salvadoran officials and their driver. Their charred bodies were found along a road about 20 miles southeast of Guatemala City.

The accused officers were taken to the prison, occupied mostly by members of the dangerous Mara Salvatrucha gang after their lawyer said their lives were in danger at the detention center in Guatemala City.