Torture by Police, Forced Disappearance & Other Ill Treatment In the early years of the 21st Century, 2000 to
2025 gvnet.com/torture/Haiti.htm
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CAUTION: The following links
have been culled from the web to illuminate the situation in Haiti. Some of these links may lead to websites that
present allegations that are unsubstantiated or even false. No attempt
has been made to validate their authenticity or to verify their content. HOW TO USE THIS WEBPAGE Students If you are looking for
material to use in a term-paper, you are advised to scan the postings on this
page and others to see which aspects of Torture by Authorities are of
particular interest to you. You might
be interested in exploring the moral justification for inflicting pain or
inhumane or degrading treatment or punishment in order to obtain critical
information that may save countless lives, or to elicit a confession for a
criminal act, or to punish someone to teach him a lesson outside of the
courtroom. Perhaps your paper might
focus on some of the methods of torture, like fear, extreme temperatures,
starvation, thirst, sleep deprivation, suffocation, or immersion in freezing
water. On the other hand, you might
choose to write about the people acting in an official capacity who
perpetrate such cruelty. There is a
lot to the subject of Torture by Authorities.
Scan other countries as well as this one. Draw comparisons between activity in
adjacent countries and/or regions.
Meanwhile, check out some of the Term-Paper
resources that are available on-line. ***
ARCHIVES *** 2020 Country
Reports on Human Rights Practices: Haiti U.S. Dept of State Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and
Labor, 30 March 2021 www.state.gov/reports/2020-country-reports-on-human-rights-practices/haiti/
[accessed 22 July
2021] TORTURE AND OTHER
CRUEL, INHUMAN, OR DEGRADING TREATMENT OR PUNISHMENT While the law
prohibits such practices, several reports from nongovernmental organizations
(NGOs) alleged that HNP officers beat or otherwise abused detainees and
suspects. Detainees were subject to cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment in
overcrowded, poorly maintained, and unsanitary prisons and makeshift
detention centers. A May 5 video clip
showed Patrick Benoit, with hands and feet tied and bloodied clothing, being dragged
on the ground by police. The incident took place after magistrate judge Ricot Vrigneau and police
officers attempted to enforce what they claimed was a court judgment. PRISON AND DETENTION
CENTER CONDITIONS Physical
Conditions: Overcrowding at prisons and detention centers was severe,
especially at the National Penitentiary in Port-au-Prince and the prison in
Cap Haitien, where each prisoner had 8.6 square
feet of space. In many prisons detainees slept in shifts due to the lack of
space. Some prisons had no beds for detainees, and some cells had no natural
light. In other prisons the cells often were open to the elements or lacked
adequate ventilation. Many prison facilities lacked adequate basic services
such as plumbing, sanitation, waste disposal, electricity, ventilation, and
lighting. ARREST PROCEDURES
AND TREATMENT OF DETAINEES Pretrial Detention:
Prolonged pretrial detention remained a serious problem due to the arbitrary application
of court rules, court discretion, corruption, and poor record keeping. The
judicial system rarely observed the constitutional mandate to bring detainees
before a judge within 48 hours. Many pretrial detainees never consulted with
an attorney, appeared before a judge, or received a docket timeline. In some
cases detainees spent years in detention without appearing before a judge. Freedom House
Country Report 2018 Edition freedomhouse.org/country/haiti/freedom-world/2018 [accessed 12 May
2020] F3. IS THERE PROTECTION FROM THE ILLEGITIMATE
USE OF PHYSICAL FORCE AND FREEDOM FROM WAR AND INSURGENCIES? A culture of violence
and impunity in law enforcement, in addition to widespread crime and
violence, leave people in Haiti with little protection from the illegitimate
use of force. In November, a
six-hour antigang police raid supported by
MINUJUSTH ended in the killing of at least nine civilians and two police
officers on a school campus in Port-au-Prince. None of the police officers
involved were disciplined or arrested. Police are regularly accused of
abusing suspects and detainees. Prisons are overcrowded and lack adequate
health and sanitation. Human
Rights Watch World Report 2015 - Events of 2014 Human Rights Watch,
29 January 2015 www.hrw.org/world-report/2015/...
or
www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/wr2015_web.pdf [accessed 18 March
2015] HAITI CRIMINAL JUSTICE
SYSTEM AND DETENTION CONDITIONS - Haiti’s prison system remains severely
overcrowded, in large part due to high numbers of arbitrary arrests and prolonged
pretrial detentions. The weak capacity of the Haitian National Police (HNP)
contributes to overall insecurity in the country. While the government and
the United Nations Stablization Mission in Haiti
(MINUSTAH), the UN peacekeeping operation in the country, have made police
reform a priority, there have been difficulties training sufficient numbers
of entry-level cadets. Haiti's Street Kids
Fear Killings By Police Canadian
Broadcasting Corporation CBC News, November 29, 2004 www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2004/11/29/haiti-children-police-041129.html [accessed 22 May
2011] Someone has been
killing street children on the streets of AMNESTY
INTERNATIONAL From an old article -- URL not available Article was
published sometime prior to 2015 IMPUNITY - Those
responsible for serious human rights violations, including enforced disappearance,
torture, rape and extrajudicial executions, over the past four decades
continued to evade justice. In January, an
investigating judge dismissed complaints of crimes against humanity filed by
22 victims against former President Jean-Claude Duvalier. He concluded that
Jean-Claude Duvalier should be tried only for corruption and misappropriation
of public funds. In his report, and contrary to Haiti’s obligations under
international law, the judge stated that Haiti’s courts were not competent to
investigate and prosecute crimes against humanity. An appeal by victims and
their relatives was pending at the end of the year. Search … AMNESTY
INTERNATIONAL For current
articles:: Search Amnesty
International Website www.amnesty.org/en/search/?q=haiti+torture&ref=&year=&lang=en&adv=1&sort=relevance [accessed 2 January 1, 2019] Scroll
Down ***
EARLIER EDITIONS OF SOME OF THE ABOVE *** Human Rights
Reports » 2005 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2005/61731.htm [accessed 31 January
2013] 2009-2017.state.gov/j/drl/rls/hrrpt/2005/61731.htm [accessed 4 July
2019] TORTURE
AND OTHER CRUEL, INHUMAN, OR DEGRADING TREATMENT OR PUNISHMENT – Although the law
prohibits such actions, members of the security forces continued to violate
these prohibitions. Police officers used excessive and sometimes deadly force
in making arrests or controlling demonstrations and rarely were punished for
such acts. Members of the HNP also used excessive force, such as shooting and
using teargas, to suppress demonstrations (see section 2.b.). On May 17, men
dressed in black and aboard a Nissan Patrol shot and killed a young man whose
body was later found, with his head covered with a bag, in the Pacot neighborhood of Port-au-Prince. The Carrefour
police station (also called Omega) was known as a center of torture and
beatings of detainees. On May 6, a team from the National Network of Defenders
of Human Rights (RNDDH) visited the station and spoke with 30 detainees, who
denounced the mistreatment they had received. The delegation observed scars
on some detainees, apparently from beatings they received while being
arrested. Nikenson Jean Baptiste, a prisoner whom
police arrested on April 26, could not remain standing while the delegation
was present. Ralphe Ramvil,
arrested on May 2, had been beaten on the testicles and had difficulties
urinating. Some of the remaining detainees complained of hearing problems and
earaches, suggesting that police tortured them by boxing their ears (kalot marassa in Creole). Judie C. Roy, who
repeatedly was tortured in various prisons during 2003 and ultimately
incarcerated at the Petionville police station for
"plotting against the security of the state," escaped from prison
following President Aristide's departure and was not rearrested. There were
no efforts made to rearrest Roy, who was the only
female presidential candidate in the scheduled elections. There were no
developments in the 2003 torture investigations of Joseline
Desroses or Jonathan Louime. All
material used herein reproduced under the fair use exception of 17 USC § 107
for noncommercial, nonprofit, and educational use. PLEASE RESPECT COPYRIGHTS OF COMPONENT
ARTICLES. Cite this
webpage as: Patt, Prof. Martin, "Torture by Police, Forced Disappearance
& Other Ill Treatment in the early years of the 21st Century-
Haiti", http://gvnet.com/torture/Haiti.htm, [accessed <date>] |
