OROCABA, JAN 1: Riot troops stormed a Brazilian prison where inmates were holding hundreds of hostages, quickly ending a three-day rebellion apparently without firing a shot. As some 250 riot police took control of Sorocaba prison yesterday, hostages streamed out the front gate, screaming and crying. Some said police had beaten them and the inmates.The government said no one was killed in the raid, although an inmate and a woman were killed in the shootout at the start of the takeover on Sunday. At least four riot troops and 10 prisoners were wounded on Wednesday, the latter suffering knife and club injuries. Police said the knife wounds were the result of prisoner-on-prisoner fighting.Riot troops could be seen running along the prison wall as explosions sounded from harmless `shock' bombs detonated to scare the rioters.Black smoke could be seen rising from inside the prison. But no gunshots were heard, and the raid was over within an hour.``From what I saw, the cops acted very well to put this thing down without any major abuses,'' said Daniel Azevedo Noronha, president of the Human Rights Defence Council of the state of Sao Paulo.Earlier in the day, it appeared that the standoff 80 km west of Brazil's largest city, Sao Paulo, might be resolved peacefully. The inmates had begun releasing some of their 600-plus inmates, who included guards and women and children who had been visiting the inmates. But police insisted that negotiations had broken down and ordered riot police to storm the prison.
