Miami — widow Jovenel Moise — The last elected president of Haiti — She described being shot and wounded during the 2021 assassination of her husband while testifying Wednesday in the US federal trial of four men accused of conspiracy in the case.
Martine Moise returned to the stand in a Miami courtroom after testifying for about an hour the day before. She was the first witness for the prosecution after that Opening statements By lawyers on Tuesday.
Jovenel Moïse was killed in the early morning hours of July 7, 2021, when about two dozen foreign mercenaries — mostly from Colombia — attacked his home near Port-au-Prince, officials said.
Arcangel Brettel Ortiz, Antonio Entreago, Walter Vintemilla and James Soulages are charged in Miami federal court with conspiring in South Florida to kidnap or kill the former Haitian leader. The assassination of Jovenel Moise led to unprecedented unrest in the Caribbean country, where gang leaders were on the rise Increasingly violent and empowering.
In her testimony on Wednesday, Martine Moise described, through a Creole interpreter, how she went to bed around 10pm the night before the attack and woke up to the sounds of gunfire about three hours later. She said she turned to her husband in the bed next to her to ask what was happening.
“My dear, we are dead,” Jovenel Moise said, according to his wife’s testimony.
Martine Moise said the shooting continued as she crawled downstairs to check on her two adult children. She said she then returned to her and her husband’s bedroom, where she and Jovenel Moise sat on the floor on either side of the bed and used it for protection from gunfire.
The men eventually burst into the room and opened fire with what appeared to be an automatic weapon, Martine Moise said. I was beaten several times. She said she heard men speaking in Spanish before one of them shot Jovenel Moise several times, killing him.
After the attackers were evacuated, Martine Moise said she expected to find the bodies of between 30 and 50 security officers assigned to protect the house, but there were none. She said she later learned they had been paid to leave their jobs.
Moise was taken to a nearby hospital for treatment and then airlifted to a Miami hospital for surgery. She testified that her right arm was still disabled and was still in pain.
Defense attorneys asked if Moise knew she was under investigation in Haiti in connection with her husband’s death. She said that the people behind her husband’s murder were now in power, and that she had fled the country for her safety. She said she offered to answer questions remotely, but the people who killed her husband want her back to Haiti so they can kill her, too. Moyes was a former accused In this case, but the charge was later dropped.
The defense also asked Moise about inconsistencies between her testimony and previous interviews with the FBI. She insisted that her current statements were correct and that she could not explain the discrepancies in FBI reports.
Lawyers for the four men on trial said the investigation launched in Haiti was a mess, and that their clients had been manipulated into taking responsibility for an internal coup.
According to prosecutors, South Florida was a central location for planning and financing the plot to oust Moise and replace him with someone chosen by the conspirators.
The four defendants face life imprisonment and have pleaded not guilty.
Ortiz and Intriago were lead directors of the Federal Academy’s Counter-Terrorism Unit and the Security Counter-Terrorism Unit, known collectively as the CTU, and Ventimiella was a director of the Worldwide Capital Lending Group. Both companies are based in South Florida.
Soulages was a representative of the counterterrorism unit in Haiti, and investigators say he was coordinating with others, including Christian Sanon, a dual Haitian-American citizen whom the plotters initially favored to replace Moise.
Defense attorneys said the group was working with FBI agents, U.S. embassy officials and members of the Haitian government in what they believed was the lawful arrest of a criminal boss. Defense noted Joseph Felix Badioua former Haitian government employee who was arrested in Haiti in 2023, as the mastermind behind a plan to use the president’s arrest to assassinate Moise.
U.S. District Judge Jacqueline Becerra blocked more than two months of trial.
Five others previously pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges in the United States and are serving life sentences. A sixth person was sentenced to nine years in prison after pleading guilty to providing body armor to the conspirators. Sanon’s trial date is scheduled to be set at a later date.
17 Colombian soldiers and three Haitian officials face charges in Haiti. Gang violence Death threats The crumbling judicial system hampered the investigation.
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