Haiti police arrest assassinated president’s top security official

Police in Haiti have arrested the late President Jovenel Moise’s security coordinator as a suspect in the case of his assassination earlier this month.

“I can confirm that Jean Laguel Civil was arrested Monday by police as part of the investigation into the assassination of President Jovenel Moise,” national police spokeswoman Marie Michelle Verrier told AFP, the news agency reported on Tuesday.

Civil joins more than two dozen detainees who are suspected of participating in the conspiracy that led to Moise’s assassination on July 7 at his home by armed commandos, who bypassed the president’s guards without firing a shot. Civil is now being held in solitary confinement at a prison in Delmas, near the capital city of Port-au-Prince.

Police authorities have also issued an arrest warrant for Wendelle Coq Thelot, a judge for the country’s highest court, who had been previously fired by Moise. Furthermore, Port-au-Prince commissioner Bed-Ford Claude has ordered immigration authorities to prohibit four of Moise’s security guards from leaving the country.

During the mid-night attack earlier this month, President Moise was shot several times, and his wife was seriously injured.

So far, at least 26 people, including 18 former Colombian soldiers, have been arrested, and police are still looking for various suspects, including a former rebel leader and an ex-Haitian senator.

Newly-appointed Prime Minister Ariel Henry has vowed to bring the perpetrators of the attack to justice.

SS