A Haitian judge in charge of the investigation into the 2021 assassination of the Caribbean nation’s last president has charged some fifty people, including his widow and a former prime minister, according to a document leaked to local media.
According to the 122-page document from Judge Walther Wesser Voltaire, made public by AyiboPost, the president’s widow Martine Moise conspired with former Prime Minister Claude Joseph to kill the president in order to replace him herself.
Moise was shot dead when armed men broke into his Port-au-Prince bedroom on the night of July 7, 2021, a raid that left the former first lady injured.
The judge’s order calls for the arrest and trial of those charged.
The former first lady did not immediately respond to Reuters’ request for comment, nor did Joseph.
Moise has criticized on social media what she calls unjust arrests and political persecutions.
A spokesperson for Henry’s office said the judge was independent and “free to issue his order in accordance with the law and his conscience.”
Henry was appointed to replace Joseph, who now leads an opposition party, days before the assassination.
He pledged to hold elections but has postponed these indefinitely citing a devastating earthquake and the growing power of heavily armed criminal gangs, for which he has sought foreign aid.
Joseph meanwhile told the Miami Herald the president’s de-facto successor, Prime Minister Ariel Henry, was the main beneficiary and was now “weaponizing the Haitian justice system” to persecute opponents in “a classic coup d’etat.”
Background
Moïse, 53, was shot dead inside his home in the Pelerin 5 neighbourhood, in the hills above Port-au-Prince at 01:00 local time on 7 July 2021, according to police.
The president was shot 12 times and had bullet wounds to his forehead and several to his torso.
His left eye had been gouged out and bones in his arm and in his ankle had been broken, according to one of the judges conducting the investigation.
Part of article culled from Reuters
Content by: Armani Brooklyn
