PORT-AU-PRINCE — Police were searching for bandits late Thursday who killed an officer and set his body on fire during an ambush the day prior by armed gangs in Source Matelas, a hamlet outside the capital city where a massacre occurred in April.
“These criminals’ more than reprehensible act will not go unpunished,” Haitian National Police (PNH) officials said in a note on Facebook on May 18. “The operations already conducted by the PNH specialized forces to track down and apprehend the thugs will continue”
The slain police officer was identified as Robertho Charleston, an agent III at the Departmental Unit for Maintaining Order of the PNH. He was from the 22nd promotion of the force and assigned to the second West Departmental Direction, according to Lionel Lazarre, general coordinator of the National Union of Haitian Police Officers (SYNAPOHA) Twitter.
During the ambush armed bandits also set fire to two armored police tanks.
The lifeless body of the victim and the two armored vehicles on fire were seen on videos circulating on social networks on May 18. In these videos, armed individuals are seen doing the salute to their leader Jhonson “Izo” André and being happy about what they have done.
“The tanks were caught in an ambush,” Lazarre said on Thursday based on information gatheredfrom PNH officials. “When the police and government authorities are in Cap-Haitien, the bandits set fire to two police tanks.”
PNH officials said that the bandits threw molotov cocktails to set fire to the armored vehicles. They condemn the attack and vow to not be intimidated.
“The PNH once again urges its brothers in arms to close ranks in this fight and not be intimidated,” the officials said in the note.
At least 84 police officers have been killed from July 2021 to April 2023, according to the latest report by a human rights organization, the Fondasyon Je Klere.
The two armored tanks burned bring to four the number of PNH armored vehicles burned by gang members. On March 12, 2021, during an operation against gangs in the Village de Dieu five police officers were killed.
On November 12, 2022, a PNH armored vehicle was set on fire in the Canaan area.
