Prisoners fought each other with knives and sticks Wednesday at a San Salvador jail, leaving 16 dead and more than a dozen injured, police said. The riot began before dawn when a group of jailed gang members clashed with other prisoners, deputy police commissioner Pedro Gonzalez said. About 1,000 prisoners are being held at the facility. Central America, especially neighboring Honduras, has struggled to make its prisons safer, even as officials crack down on violent gang activity and crowd jails with more arrests. In May, a fire at a prison in northern Honduras killed 106 people. Officials said the fire was caused by an air conditioner short-circuit that ignited bedding and curtains and spread quickly through the prison. Survivors say the inferno was set deliberately. On April 5, 2003, an uprising in Honduras' El Porvenir prison farm, 220 miles (350 kilometers) north of the capital, left nearly 70 people dead. A government report blamed guards for many of the deaths. Some prisoners were locked in their cells, doused with gasoline, and set on fire. -
