Last Updated on April 29, 2020, 8:29 AM AST by Anthony Morris
The Haitian Minister of justice and public security had announced last week that the Government forces would be conducting a raid to curb gang violence in Village de Dieu, a low-income neighbourhood in Port-au-Prince.
He gave the good people, a period of 72 hours to leave, and said that the Government was “not responsible” for whatever would happen afterwards.
A day after the announcement which was made on April 24, Jimmy Cherizier – a former police officer implicated in human rights violations and fired in December 2018 – said that he and 19 other police officers would be “cleaning up” Village de Dieu by a raid.
Cherzie describes himself now as a community leader who is protecting his neighbourhood from other rival gangs. Still, local human rights groups have been accusing Cherzie of leading the Delmas 6 gang.
The United Nations Integrated Office in Haiti and the National Network for the Defense of Human Rights have reported that Cherizier has been implicated in two massacres which took place in Port-au-Prince, and at least one of them. At the same time, he was still a police officer.
In the first massacre, a minimum of 71 people had been killed in La Saline neighbourhood between November 13 and November 17, 2018.
It was reported by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights that charges had been brought against 98 people who were implicated in the killings during the massacre and for hurling other abuses, including two senior officials of the state.
United Nations Mission for Justice Support in Haiti, said that during confrontations between rival gangs in La Saline, up to 150 houses were looted and 11 women and girls were raped.
The mission said that the criminal gangs who were competing for the control were responsible for the abuses, but they operated with the cooperation of several state actors, including Cherizier.
Between the period from November 4 to November 6, 2019, Cherizier and other members of the Delmas 6 gang had allegedly led an attack against local residents in the Bel-Air neighbourhood.
The resident had refused to remove barricades which the people had raised to protest against a Government announcement of ending a fuel subsidy.
At least three people were killed in the attack, 6 persons were wounded, and about 30 houses and 11 cars had been burned.
Anthony Morris covers stories related to politics and regional developments. His in-depth reporting about governance and reforms makes him stand out in regional journalism, with a deep analysis of political trends and their impact on Caribbean communities.
