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A riot at one of South Carolina’s most dangerous prisons left seven inmates dead and 17 others injured, a prison official said Monday.
Lee Correctional Institution was secured at around 2:55 a.m., nearly eight hours after multiple fights broke out in three housing units Sunday night, prison spokesman Jeff Taillon said. The incident started around 7:15 p.m., he said.
All prison staff and responding law enforcement officers were reported safe after the incident, the South Carolina Department of Corrections wrote in a tweet. The department added the State Law Enforcement Division was assisting prison officials in its investigation.
Emergency services from several South Carolina counties responded to the “mass casualty incident,” Lee County Fire wrote in a tweet.
Lee County Coroner Larry Logan told the Associated Press that the seven inmates who were killed during the riot died of stabbing and slashing wounds. Logan said he arrived at a chaotic scene.