Miami (January 24, 2014)—The Inter American Press Association (IAPA) today described as “an important step against impunity” the legal action against nine suspects alleged to be implicated in the murder of Haitian journalist Jean Léopold Dominique.
On January 17 Criminal Court Judge Yvickel Dabrésil sent a report to the Appeals Court in which the suspects are accused of alleged participation in the April 3, 2000 murder of Dominique, director of Radio Haiti Inter. Also killed in the attack was the radio station’s security guard, Jean Claude Luissaint.
In 2001 an IAPA investigation declared that the murder was a “political conspiracy apparently planned and conceived over several months by leading political figures tied to (former Haitian President) Aristide.” The on-site investigation and official inquiries were moving slowly, due to unfounded accusations, lack of evidence and judicial inaction provoked by threats to witnesses, prosecutors and judges, which led to several judicial officials withdrawing from the case and seven judges being involved in the proceedings.
The chairman of the IAPA’s Committee on Freedom of the Press and Information, Claudio Paolillo, said, “Identifying those accused of a murder committed 14 years ago is a major advance in the battle against impunity, but it is important to ensure that justice prevails in this and other crimes against journalists that have not yet been resolved in that country.”
Those accused are: Mirlande Libérus Pavert, former senator of the Familia Lavalas party, as the alleged instigator of the murder; Gabriel Harold Severe, former deputy mayor of Port-au-Prince; Annette Auguste and Franco Camille, party activists; Dimsley Milien, alleged perpetrator, and Mérite Milien, Jeudy Jean Daniel, Markington Michel and Toussaint Mercidieu. None of them have been arrested.
Dominique, who was 69 years old when he was killed, was Haiti’s most outstanding journalist. His murder shook the country, which saw him as an unconditional, but critical, supporter of the Familia Lavalas party, then in power.
He was an adviser to former president René Préval and a friend of former president Jean Bertrand Aristide. He was shot to death as he was arriving at his radio station. He gained popularity for having the first station to air programs in Creole, French the official language at the time in Haiti.
Paolillo, editor of the Montevideo, Uruguay, weekly Búsqueda, added, “We are pleased with this decision and we trust that the Dominique case will be dealt with to the final consequences and that it will serve as a model to prevent other cases from remaining unpunished.”
The IAPA is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to the defense and promotion of freedom of the press and of expression in the Americas. It is made up of more than 1,300 print publications from throughout the Western Hemisphere and is based in Miami, Florida. For more information please go to http://www.sipiapa.org.
