Venezuelan police station holding cells are filling up as the country’s new prisons minister orders a freeze on new admissions to the violent, overcrowded prisons operating at nearly 400% capacity. [Washington Post] Venezuelan prisons are known to be effectively run by armed gangs, house inmates in inhumane conditions, and be the scene of numerous violent uprisings and clashes between prisoners and security forces, resulting in hundreds of deaths in the past year alone. In the past year alone, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights has on four occasions issued condemnations of Venezuelan prison conditions, and granted precautionary measures for relatives of the Rodeo I and Rodeo II prisoners who were subjected to tear gas and water cannons by state forces outside those prisons. In the past, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights has granted provisional measures to protect the lives and physical integrity of Venezuelan prisoners at Centro Penitenciario de Aragua “Cárcel de Tocorón”, Uribana Prison, Yare I and Yare II Capital Region Penitentiary Center, Rodeo I and Rodeo II, La Pica, and Cárcel de Vista Hermosa. The Court also issued a judgment against Venezuela in Montero-Aranguren et al. (Detention Center of Catia), after finding that guards and security forces had fired indiscriminately on prisoners, resulting in dozens of deaths and disappearances.