Two men, convicted debt collectors and violent abusers, were transferred from the general ward of the maximum security prison Litla-Hraun to isolation yesterday. They are suspected of having inflicted injuries upon a fellow prisoner which led to his death.
Litla-Hraun. Photo by Páll Stefánsson.
The 49-year-old repeat offender called for assistance when he had difficulties breathing in his cell on Thursday, Fréttablaðið reports.
He passed away shortly afterwards and efforts to resuscitate him were in vain. There were no wounds or bruises on his body and no indications that he had been attacked.
The body was autopsied and preliminary results arrived yesterday. The autopsy indicates that the victim died from internal bleeding and the injuries strongly indicate that he was assaulted. The man had only been in prison for one day before he died.
The two suspects were arrested in mid-March during an extensive police raid related to serious assaults and other violations, considered to the result of a struggle between crime gangs.
The two suspects have been charged with having on three occasions attacked people in their homes, beating them with golf clubs, weights and bats, causing bone fractures.
At first they were in custody but afterwards kept in prison to continue serving older sentences: one of them had been given seven and a half years for a brutal murder attempt with an axe and the other four years for drug smuggling.
Click here to read more about the prisoner’s death.
ESA
