Haiti jailbreak leaves 4 inmates dead, 2 at large–police

People flee their neighborhoods after after armed gangs terrorized the Delmas 24 and Solino areas on the night of May 1, in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, May 2 ,2024. Haiti’s transitional ruling council, which is leading the Caribbean nation amid a wave of gang violence, chose politician Edgard Leblanc Fils as its head on April 30, 2024. Announcement of the selection comes after the long-awaited council was sworn in last week, marking a step forward in restoring functional government. Agence France-Presse

PORT-AU-PRINCE — A jailbreak at a prison in northern Haiti led to a lockdown on the streets of the coastal city of Port-de-Paix, as authorities tried to recapture escapees with a pair still at large, police said Saturday.

Six fugitives had been apprehended since the Friday night escape. Four others were shot dead.

Gang violence beginning at the end of February — plunging impoverished and politically unstable Haiti deeper into chaos —  has led to more than 4,600 inmates escaping from prisons, according to the United Nations.

READ: Hundreds of inmates flee after armed gangs storm Haiti’s main prison

In Haiti’s North-West department, a relatively calm area compared to the country’s gang-plagued capital Port-au-Prince, police spokesman Leonel Joseph told a press conference that “of the eight escapees, six have already been caught.”

Four inmates were shot dead while trying to escape from a 37-person cellblock, where the jailbreak originated, he added.

The cellblock holds inmates convicted of violent crimes who are considered dangerous, said deputy government commissioner Jeir Pierre, speaking on Port-au-Prince’s Magik 9 radio station.

READ: Haiti’s transitional council names new prime minister 

To recapture the escapees, judicial and police authorities ordered all residents off the streets of Port-de-Paix. Detonations were heard in the city, a local resident told AFP.

Pierre suggested negligence had enabled the escape.

“A guard opened the door of a cell to help an inmate who had apparently become unwell, and it was at this point that fellow inmates took advantage of the situation to… force open the prison door to escape,” he said, adding that two police officers have been placed in solitary confinement while an investigation unfolds.

Haiti has been politically unstable for decades. But since late February, gangs launched coordinated attacks against strategic sites, claiming they wanted to overthrow then prime minister Ariel Henry.

Since the gang unrest exploded, “more than 4,600 inmates have escaped from Port-au-Prince’s two main prisons, at least 22 police stations and sub-stations and other police buildings have been ransacked or set on fire, and 19 police officers have been killed or wounded,” the UN reported in mid-April.

Henry resigned last month, and a transitional presidential council now governs, with the onerous task of trying to re-establish law and order in the Caribbean country.