<\/p>\n
In this file photo, Haitian President Jovenel Moise, accompanied by his wife Martine Marie Etienne Joseph, speaks to a group of Haitians living in South Florida in 2017. Moise was assassinated at his home in 2021.<\/p>\n
PEDRO PORTAL<\/p>\n
pportal@miamiherald.com<\/p>\n
Gunfire awakened Haiti\u2019s first lady Martine Mo\u00efse at 1 a.m on a summer night nearly five years ago. As the popping sound drew closer to her family\u2019s hillside home above Port-au-Prince, her initial concern was the safety of her two children, prosecutor Jason Wu said during the Miami federal trial of four men accused of plotting to kill her husband.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe rushed downstairs and told them to get into a windowless first floor bathroom where she hoped they would not be hit by any stray bullets,\u201d which was where the couple\u2019s college-age daughter and son hid with the family dog, Wu told jurors during closing arguments on Monday.<\/p>\n
When she returned to the upstairs master bedroom, Martine and President Jovenel Mo\u00efse \u201clay on the ground, hoping against all the odds,\u201d for help to arrive, Wu said. But a squad of Colombian mercenaries arrived first and smashed through the bedroom door, opening fire and \u201chitting and badly wounding\u201d the first lady. As she bled, she was forced to watch as the \u201ctrained killers\u201d shot her husband \u201cso many times that it looked like his body was bouncing off of the floor,\u201d Wu said.<\/p>\n
The assassination of Haiti\u2019s president on July 7, 2021, was the culmination of three months of planning that began in South Florida, where the four defendants on trial and others met to overthrow the country\u2019s leader in their quest for power, contracts and money in Haiti, according to the indictment. All four defendants face up to life in prison if they are convicted of conspiring to kidnap or kill Haiti\u2019s president. The indictment includes several other counts related to the conspiracy charge.<\/p>\n
On Tuesday, the U.S. District Judge Jacqueline Becerra instructed the 12-member jury, telling them they could not consider the guilt of other suspects in their deliberations, which began late in the day and will resume Wednesday. She was alluding to Joseph F\u00e9lix Badio, a former Haitian anti-corruption official who played a pivotal role in transforming the plot, at a meeting in Port-au-Prince in mid-June 2021, from arresting Mo\u00efse arrest to killing him.<\/p>\n
And while all four defendants were tried at the same time, the jurors were instructed they have to consider each one\u2019s guilt individually. Arc\u00e1ngel Pretel Ortiz and Antonio Intriago, the owners of Counter Terrorist Federal Academy and Counter Terrorist Unit Security, collectively known as CTU, are accused of hiring the squad of former Colombian soldiers who stormed the president\u2019s home.<\/p>\n
The two men, along with co-defendants James Solages, who worked for CTU, and Walter Veintemilla, who is accused of helping to finance the operation, are charged with conspiring to kidnap or kill the president and related offenses.<\/p>\n
A fifth defendant, Christian Emmanuel Sanon, a Haitian doctor and pastor, could not go to trial with them because of his poor health. Sanon, 67, was a key figure in the South Florida-Haiti coup plot because he was initially the man that CTU\u2019s owners and other co-conspirators backed as a successor to Mo\u00efse as Haiti\u2019s president.<\/p>\n
Long before trial, six other defendants pleaded guilty to the main conspiracy charge or lesser charges, including a former Haitian senator, a Haitian businessman once convicted of drug trafficking, and two former Colombian soldiers, all of whom testified for the prosecution at trial.<\/p>\n
\u2018Called the shots\u2019<\/p>\n
While the former Colombian soldiers were the hired guns who \u201cpulled the trigger,\u201d Wu said, the defendants on trial in Miami were \u201cthe men who called the shots.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThey are the ones who plotted for months from the comfort of their office chairs and cell phones right here in South Florida to overthrow, kidnap or kill president Mo\u00efse,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The widow of Haiti\u2019s slain president testified at the beginning of the trial that her husband\u2019s assailants were speaking Spanish when they fatally shot him \u2014 bolstering the government\u2019s case that a Colombian hit team was recruited by the four South Florida men linked to the security firm in the Miami area.<\/p>\n
Martine Mo\u00efse identified two of the gunmen as \u201cPipe\u201d and \u201cJefe.\u201d In a key court filing, prosecutors said that the gunman called \u201cPipe\u201d was a former Colombian special-forces soldier named Victor Albeiro Pineda Cardona. During closing, the prosecution identified him and the leader of the first group of Colombians as those responsible for sending a photo of the president\u2019s blood-soaked corpse at 1:58 a.m. the day of the assassination from a burner cell phone.<\/p>\n
In an effort to cast doubt on the government\u2019s case, defense lawyers have insisted that Mo\u00efse was already dead by the time the 20 Colombians, along with Solages and Joseph Vincent, a Haitian American who has pleaded guilty, arrived at the president\u2019s home. They maintained that the commandos were accompanying Haitian authorities to carry out an arrest \u2013 and over two days of closing arguments accused Haitians of carrying out the killing and setting up the four defendants and the Colombians.<\/p>\n
Neither the government\u2019s evidence nor that from the Haitian police, including an AR-15 style assault weapon borrowed from the parallel Haiti investigation, can be trusted, lawyers for each of the defendants told jurors.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is a Haitian plot, and it is a Haitian conspiracy,\u201d Intriago\u2019s attorney, Emmanuel Perez, said on Monday.<\/p>\n
\u201cHistory is not going to remember him as the martyred son of Haiti,\u201d he continued about Mo\u00efse, a controversial figure who was the subject of mass anti-government protests in the months before his brazen murder. \u201cHistory will remember him as a dictator, as a drug trafficker, as someone that was involved in the murder of people in La Saline and is a usurper of democracy.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2018All lies\u2019<\/p>\n
Intriago, 62, was being used \u201cas a scapegoat,\u201d Perez said. Prosecutors are asking the jury \u201cto ignore 250 years of American jurisprudence and American police procedures,\u201d he said, arguing that FBI agents conducted a flawed investigation of the president\u2019s murder, with no fingerprints, no DNA and no chain of custody. He described the autopsy and forensic examination as \u201chorrific,\u201d saying two bullets pulled out of the president\u2019s forearm and back were planted from the semi-automatic AR-15 rifle, that was used in the president\u2019s slaying.<\/p>\n
Defense lawyers pointed to inconsistencies in the testimony, especially that of the first lady, who initially told the FBI that she was hiding under the bed in the couple\u2019s bedroom but testified that she couldn\u2019t fit under it because the frame was too low.<\/p>\n
They also questioned the credibility of cooperating witnesses, including German Rivera, a leader of the Colombian commandos who was at the president\u2019s home when he was killed. Rivera, who accused Haitian police of torturing him for 29 days after his arrest, testified that Solages, 40, informed him and others in the hours before the attack on Mo\u00efse\u2019s home that it was going to be a slaughter.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe comes out and tells us, \u2018James said, \u2018We\u2019re going to kill the president, his wife, the children, the dog, the cat and even the parrot,\u2019 Solages\u2019 lawyer, Jonathan Friedman, told jurors on Monday. \u201cAll lies, all fabrication.\u201d<\/p>\n
Solages, he said, did not join any plan to kidnap or kill Mo\u00efse. Solages \u201cjust honestly believed in good faith that he was assisting Haitian authorities in the lawful arrest\u201d of Mo\u00efse.<\/p>\n
If anything, Friedman said, the behavior of the president\u2019s wife seemed suspicious.<\/p>\n
\u201cMartine Mo\u00efse, it\u2019s our position, somehow was involved in this,\u201d Friedman said. \u201cI don\u2019t think she killed her husband, but I think she somehow knew about it. I think she was complicit in it.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2018Rush to judgment\u2019<\/p>\n
Attorney David Howard, whose client, Pretel, had worked as an FBI informant for 10 years until the killing, argued that prosecutors had failed to prove their case beyond a reasonable doubt. He pointed out that Pretel, 53, and others hosted a meeting at CTU\u2019s office in Doral with a few FBI agents to talk about criminal activity in Haiti, but they also tried to raise the sensitive topic of Haiti\u2019s political crisis and regime change.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou don\u2019t invite your FBI handler to your murder plot,\u201d Howard said.<\/p>\n
Howard said FBI agents had already made up their minds about the assassination case before they went to Haiti after Mo\u00efse\u2019s death.<\/p>\n
\u201cBefore they commenced their investigation, they had their man, or their culprits,\u201d Howard told the jurors \u201cI am not telling you that, they said that. \u2026 There\u2019s a difference between investigating a case and making a case. When you investigate, you follow where the evidence leads. When you make a case you have a target.\u201d<\/p>\n
Like other defense lawyers, Howard said the FBI\u2019s probe was sloppy and incomplete, noting that Mo\u00efse\u2019s body was removed and missing for three days. Other evidence, such as shell casings, was removed. He said prosecutors stitched together a bunch of disparate text messages.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey cherry-picked the ones that put the poorest light and they doubled down by giving you the poorest interpretation and they patched it all together in what they call a 900-page exhibit,\u201d he said. \u201cIt does not match the forensic evidence. What happened here \u2026 was a rush to judgment.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t know what happened down there. They don\u2019t either. You don\u2019t either,\u201d Howard said. \u201cFor you, this is not the time to investigate. \u2026 Your sole job is to grade their efforts and determine whether or not what you\u2019ve been presented is free of reasonable doubt.\u201d<\/p>\n
Though the government has accused the Colombians of killing Moise, they did not identify the shooter and neither did any of the witnesses who testified. The other mystery is the timing of the attack.<\/p>\n
Both the prosecutors and defense used footage from a drone video on the night of the attack to make their cases. Howard told jurors that vehicles arriving in the president\u2019s Pelerin 5 neighborhood at just after 2 a.m. were carrying the Colombian commandos. And that timing would place them at the crime scene after Moise was killed, he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Colombians got there after the shooting started,\u201d he said. \u201cAn hour and eight minutes after [the couple\u2019s daughter] Jomarlie and her mother said the shooting began.\u201d<\/p>\n
But prosecutors disagreed, saying the Colombians had already arrived at the scene and were directly responsible for the Haitian president\u2019s death before 2 a.m.<\/p>\n
Howard also highlighted $20,000 worth of ammunition that Badio had acquired as the Colombians struggled to acquire bullets and guns. The ammunition, he said, ended up with members of his presidential detail, who were being bribed by Badio to lay down their guns and on the night of the attack did not suffer any casualties or injuries.<\/p>\n
Howard, the final defense lawyer to close, told jurors that the real culprit is Badio, the former Haitian official in Moise\u2019s government. U.S. authorities refused to ask the Haitian government to turn him over to face charges in Miami, despite Haiti\u2019s request to do so.<\/p>\n
Howard cited a set of stipulations both sides had agreed to that further sowed doubt, including unverified allegations the U.S. government had received that former president Michel Martelly and the prime minister at the time, Ariel Henry helped hide Badio while he was on the lam for two years \u2013 and that Henry was in contact with him right before or after the killing.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat are they talking about?\u201d Howard said. \u201cAriel Henry and Michel Martelly were allegedly aware. \u2026 Haitians were responsible for his [Moise\u2019s] death.\u201d<\/p>\n
In a rebuttal, prosecutor Sean McLaughlin told jurors that the fact the government agreed on the stipulations is no indication that they have any proof of the allegations.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat the stipulation is\u2026 we are agreeing, in fact, that when you go to Publix, the National Enquirer and tabloids are in the shop,\u201d he said. \u201cBy no means are we agreeing that what\u2019s inside the National Enquirer is true.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2018A rat\u2019<\/p>\n
Marissel Descalzo, one of the lawyers for Veintemilla, said in her closing arguments that few of the 40-plus witnesses mentioned her client during the trial for a reason: he was not involved in any assassination plot, she said.<\/p>\n
Veintemilla, she said, is a businessman who was told that Sanon, the initial candidate to be Haiti\u2019s next president, had significant political support. The idea was to replace Mo\u00efse with Sanon, who would deliver on future security projects for CTU\u2019s owners.<\/p>\n
Veintemilla was also told the FBI and State Department were involved and he tried to get politicians and the press involved. \u201cHe tells other people to try to get support for this project,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
She acknowledged that Veintemilla\u2019s company, Worldwide Capital Lending Group, loaned CTU about $175,000 to provide security for Sanon in Haiti, and that her client paid for the Colombian commandos to travel to Haiti. He also paid for hotel arrangements for Sanon and some of the Colombians in Haiti. And, she admitted that her client provided $1,000 after Mo\u00efse was killed to try and bring some of the Colombians back home.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo money to kill or kidnap the president, no material support,\u201d Descalzo told the jurors. \u201cWhy is it unreasonable for Walter to believe he was providing security?.\u2026 That\u2019s what he thought.\u201d<\/p>\n
The government, she said, wants to convict her client because he sent a voice mail on June 9, 2021 \u2013 less than a month before Mo\u00efse\u2019s death \u2013 about \u201chitting the rat.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cCalling someone a rat is not enough to convict someone of kidnapping or an assassination,\u201d Descalzo said. He was exercising his freedom of speech, \u201chis right to call President Mo\u00efse a rat because that\u2019s what he thought of him.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In this file photo, Haitian President Jovenel Moise, accompanied by his wife Martine Marie Etienne Joseph, speaks to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":260252,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[225,227,226],"class_list":["post-260251","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-hialeah","tag-hialeah","tag-hialeah-headlines","tag-hialeah-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260251","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=260251"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260251\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/260252"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=260251"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=260251"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=260251"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}