They have control over the country’s infrastructure, from police stations to seaports. They chased hundreds of thousands of people from the capital. And they are suspected of having links to the assassination of the Haitian president in 2021.
Western diplomats and officials say the influence and capabilities of many Haitian gangs are evolving, making them increasingly threatening to the country. Kenyan-led multinational police force soon to be deployed in Haiti, as well as the fragile transition council which is trying to chart a course for the elections.
With their arrival in a few daysthe 2,500 police officers will face a gang force better equipped, financed, trained and unified than any mission previously deployed to the Caribbean country, security experts say.
Once largely dependent on Haiti’s political and economic elite for their money, some gangs have found independent financial lifelines since the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse in 2021 and the subsequent collapse of the state.
“The gangs made their money through kidnapping and extortion, as well as payments made by politicians during elections and by business elites in between,” said William O’Neill, the rights expert. the man appointed by the United Nations for Haiti.
“But the gangs are now much more autonomous and no longer need the financial support of the old guard,” he added. “They have created a Frankenstein that is beyond anyone’s control.”
Helping gangs is an arsenal more powerful than anything they’ve ever possessed before, according to two Justice Department officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive intelligence assessments. Since February, some gangs have acquired automatic weapons — perhaps a mix of weapons stolen from regional militaries and others converted from semi-automatic rifles, officials said.
The gangs have also changed their public posture, posting videos on social media of themselves acting like militias with national ambitions and less concerned with their usual turf wars.
Some of Haiti’s gangs began working together last September, when they announced the creation of an alliance called Vivre Ensemble, just days after the The Dominican Republic closed its land border with Haiti.
The idea was to unite the gangs to overcome the obstacles that the border closure posed to their drug trafficking operations, according to two Western diplomats focused on Haiti who were not authorized to speak publicly.
But the alliance collapsed about a week after its announcement, after some two tons of cocaine were stolen from Haitian gang leader Johnson André, known as Izo, diplomats said.
Izo 5 Segonn gang, or “Five Seconds” in Creoleis considered the country’s largest cocaine trafficker, shipping much of its production directly to Europe, diplomats say.
At the end of February, Vivre Ensemble was reborn. The gangs publicly pledged to overthrow the country’s prime minister and vowed to resist Kenyan-led security forces once they were deployed, calling them “invaders.”
A few days later, the alliance stormed two prisons, release some 4,600 prisoners, many of whom joined their ranks. The chaos forced the Haitian prime minister, who was abroad, to resign.
Among the escapees was Dimitri Hérard, according to Haitian officials, the head of the security unit that protected Mr. Moïse’s presidential palace before his assassination. Mr. Hérard ordered his forces to withdraw as mercenaries stormed Mr. Moïse’s house. He was in jail awaiting trial on charges related to the assassination when he was released during the escape.
Mr. Hérard now helps organize and advise Izo’s gang and could establish links with larger criminal organizations in the region, including drug cartels, according to a senior regional intelligence official and the two Western diplomats.
Mr. Hérard could not be reached for comment.
Haitian gangs appear to use weapons also used by the Gulf Clan, a Colombian cartel that operates along the country’s Caribbean coast and uses neighboring countries to traffic cocaine. Colombian President Gustavo Petro said last month that thousands of military weapons had been stolen and sold to armed groups, such as cartels, and could have gone to Haiti.
Another powerful gang leader, Vitel’homme Innocent, has also been linked by authorities to Mr. Moïse’s murder. He rented one of the cars used in Mr. Moïse’s killing, according to a Haitian police report.
Mr. Hérard was also a prime suspect in one of the largest cases ever prosecuted by the Drug Enforcement Administration in Haiti. In 2015, the Cargo MV Manzanares docked in Port-au-Prince with more than 1,000 kilograms of cocaine and heroin hidden among bags of sugar.
At the time, Michel Martelly was president of Haiti and Mr. Hérard was a high-ranking member of its presidential security force. Mr. Hérard was seen by several witnesses at the port, ordering members of the presidential guard to transport the drugs off the ship and into police vehicles.
Most of the drugs involved in the case have disappeared. Witnesses were intimidated by Haitian government officials, including Jimmy Chérizier, a police officer, according to Keith McNichols, a former Drug Enforcement Administration officer who worked on the case.
Mr. Chérizier, also known as Barbecue, is now one of Haiti’s most powerful gang leaders and a key part of the Vivre Ensemble coalition.
“Gangs are increasingly linked to drug trafficking,” said the United Nations’ Mr. O’Neill. “And given that some former police officers like Hérard were involved in drug trafficking when Martelly came to power, it would not surprise me if gangs now try to woo these former security officials.”
More recently, officials with knowledge of negotiations for the appointment of a new Haitian prime minister said that Mr. Martelly had lobbied Caribbean leaders and his political allies to try to influence the composition of the interim government.
His allies on the transition council have quietly floated a proposal that immunity should be given to the gangs, the officials said, perhaps as part of broader immunity for former government officials who could be accused of corruption.
“I categorically deny these unfounded allegations of active interference in the transition council,” Mr. Martelly said in a statement to the New York Times, calling the accusations politically motivated. “I have never had any involvement with gangs and I have never referred to amnesty to anyone.”
The government of Mr. Martelly, who was president from 2011 to 2016, was accused of endemic corruptionincluding the misappropriation of aid worth approximately 2 billion dollars from Venezuela. In 2022, Canada imposed sanctions on him and other Haitian politicians to protect and empower local gangs, “including through money laundering and other acts of corruption.”
“The idea of an amnesty could add fuel to the fire if Haitians are not consulted,” said Romain Le Cour, Haiti security analyst at the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime, “ given the inability of politicians to come together in this moment of crisis. crisis and given that gangs have committed serious human rights violations.
The report was provided by Christian Triebert, André Paultre, John Ismay, Adam Entous, Julian E. Barnes And David C. Adams.
