Gunshots, fires and new tensions in Port-au-Prince spark fear of prison break, more trouble
Tensions are once again growing within the walls of Haiti’s jam-packed main prison, where some of the most high-profile prisoners accused in last year’s assassination of President Jovenel Moïse are being held.
Inmates in the National Penitentiary say they have to deal with the constant noise of gunfire that appears as if it’s coming from both inside and outside the prison, which is once again struggling to provide them with food, water and fresh air.
Acknowledging the gunshots in the vicinity of the prison and concerns about a possible prison beak, Jacques Lafontant, the chief prosecutor for Port-au-Prince, said “the situation is under control.”
“There is no mutiny or evasion up to now,” he said. “There are several backups present at the prison.”
Gangs have been extending their grip on the capital, where the United Nations said more than 470 people were killed, injured or unaccounted for between July 8 and 17 after a gang war erupted in the slum of Cité Soleil. Around 3,000 people have fled their homes, including hundreds of unaccompanied children, while at least 140 houses have been destroyed or burned down.
At the center of the deadly assault is the all powerful G-9 Family and Allies. Already blamed for the Cité Soleil attack earlier this month, the G-9, led by a former cop turned gang leader Jimmy “Barbecue” Chérizier, is accused of launching a new attack Wednesday against the working class neighborhood of Bel Air, located not far from the presidential palace grounds, alongside ally gang Krache Dife, which is Haitian Creole for Spit Fire.
Video of the scene showed Haiti National Police firing back at well-armed gang members, as they ran across empty streets in the area not far from the palace grounds. As police sought cover on street corners, gang members fired back with the sound of heavy automatic gunfire.
One possible motive for the attacks, according to sources, is to prevent Haitian police from carrying out an investigation at the ports, where authorities have been searching shipping containers looking for illegal arms and ammunition and drugs. The shooting has not only paralyzed most of Port-au-Prince, but the ability of police to continue with their search of shipping containers.
Haiti Police did not respond to the Miami Herald’s request for comments.
“We do not yet know how many people have been killed or injured,” said Pierre Esperance of the National Human Rights Defense Network, a human rights group. “What we know is that since this morning it’s been like a siege in downtown Port-au-Prince with the amount of automatic gunfire going off.”
The National Penitentiary is located not far from the Champ de Mars, near downtown Port-au-Prince, where a new fresh round of gang violence has made the center of downtown a no-go zone.
In the nearby residential neighborhood of Pacot, a resident told the Miami Herald that he had a stray bullet hit his dining room wall. Closer to downtown, police were called out earlier in the week to the offices of the ministry of the interior, where tires had been set ablaze reportedly to protest late salaries. On Wednesday firefighters were called to put out a fire at earthquake-ravaged Port-au-Prince Cathedral.
The State University of Haiti, located across from the nearby General Hospital, announced the temporary suspension of all academic activities as of Wednesday.
“In less than a week, several lost projectiles were found on the campus and even in classrooms,” the university said in a note.
To the east of the capital, a second courthouse was attacked by gangs. Ainé Martin, the head of the National Court Clerks Association, confirmed Wednesday that while the main courthouse remains under gang control after it was taken over on June 10, a second one in Croix-des-Bouquets was the target of arson. Gang members set fire to at least 10 prosecutors’ offices in the courthouse and burned files, Martin said. The crime was reportedly committed by the gang 400 Mawozo.
In the northern city of Gonaives, tensions rose as commercial activities became paralyzed due to automatic gunfire and burning barricades
But it was the scene unfolding around the prison that has Haitian officials worried.
“There is a lot, a lot of shooting in the area,” said Marie Yolène Gilles, who runs the human rights group Fondasyon Je Klere, or Eyes Wide Open Foundation. “Today, anything can happen inside the prisons because the prisoners are all saying they can’t take it anymore. They are malnourished, they are depressed.”
READ MORE: Who killed Haitian President Jovenel Moïse? Two key suspects speak out from jail
Haiti’s incarcerated population has been experiencing increasingly worsening conditions for some time, but the food and water shortages are becoming chronic. In June, the United Nations Security Council issued a report saying that between January and April, at least 54 inmates had died inside the country’s prison system due to malnutrition.
Soon after, the chief prosecutor in the southwest city of Les Cayes announced the death of eight more inmates in the city’s overcrowded prison due to hunger and high temperatures.
“The prison is a link in a chain; once one prison has a problem, all of the prisons have problems,” said Gilles, a human rights activist who visits the prisons to check on inmates being subjected to prolonged detention. “Once someone is imprisoned today, they are simply thrown away. They do not have access to any medical or health care. They do not have food. It’s a situation that is very alarming.”
Gilles said the prisons are relying on churches and nonprofit groups to provide food for inmates. In May, for example, the charity Hope for Haiti conducted a mobile clinic at the prison in Les Cayes after members of the charity’s public health team became concerned with conditions there.
In the case of the National Penitentiary, Gilles said prisoners who do not have relatives or friends to bring them food are increasingly having to fend for themselves. Prisoners with access to money are able to buy food from vendors, who she said are being allowed inside.
Gilles said inmates have been calling her complaining about the conditions inside the prison and that officials were using the shootings on the Champ de Mars as an excuse to not let them out of their cells.
“Where is the money that is supposed to be unblocked every month to give the prisoners food, to purchase fuel?” she said. “There needs to be a serious investigation launched into the National Prison Administration to see what they have done with the money they are supposed to be using to feed the prisoners.”
Lafontant, the chief prosecutor, said food is being prepared for inmates. He did not address the complaints about the water shortage inside the prison that Gilles said is preventing inmates from bathing. Haiti Justice Minister Berto Dorcé did not respond to a request for comment.
This story was originally published July 27, 2022 at 4:09 PM.
