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Suspect in killings of U.S. missionary couple and nonprofit chief arrested in Haiti
Police in Haiti have arrested a suspect in the fatal shooting of a U.S. missionary couple and a Haitian man who headed a nonprofit in an attack by gunmen earlier this year that stunned many in the troubled Caribbean country.
The May 23 killings of missionaries Davy Lloyd and his wife, Natalie Lloyd, and Jude Montis, the country’s director for Missions in Haiti Inc., a Claremore, Oklahoma organization, was blamed on gangs rampaging across Haiti’s capital and beyond.
The killings took place in the community of Lizon, in northern Port-au-Prince. The city has crumbled under the relentless violence of gangs that control as much as 80% of the Haitian capital.
A video posted on social media late Wednesday by Haiti’s National Police shows a 52-year-old man in handcuffs, accused of being involved in the killings of the Lloyds and Montis.
Arrests in high-profile killings are very rare in Haiti. In the video, the suspect denies any involvement in the killings. It wasn’t immediately clear if the man has been charged and if he has a lawyer.
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Police claim the suspect’s phone was used to make calls after the killings, but the man rejected that accusation.
David Lloyd, the father of Davy Lloyd, told The Associated Press over the phone from Oklahoma on Thursday that he wasn’t aware of the circumstances behind the suspect’s arrest.
The young couple — Davy was 23 and Natalie just 21 — were supposed to celebrate their two-year wedding anniversary in June.
“They loved the Haitian people and were dedicated to that country,” Lloyd said of his son and daughter-in law.
Natalie Lloyd was the daughter of Missouri state Rep. Ben Baker. At the time of the killings, Baker said that his heart was “broken in a thousand pieces.”
David Lloyd said his son had called him the night of the attack, to tell him that gangs had forced them to open the mission gates and looted the compound before he abruptly hung up. He said his son and others came under gunfire before the gang broke into the home and killed them.
They later set the house on fire, Lloyd said, adding that more than about 100 gang members were believed to have participated in the attack. The Lloyds’ bodies were brought to the U.S. Embassy, Baker said in May, and were flown to Miami from Port au Prince a few days later. .
Odelyn Joseph / AP
The mission compound has since closed, the first time in 26 years, and the children the mission served relocated to a safer community.
“There are too many gangs in the area,” Lloyd said. “The country as a whole seems hopeless.”
From January to May, more than 3,200 killings were reported across Haiti, with gang violence leaving more than half a million people homeless, according to the United Nations.
In February, gangs launched coordinated attacks on key government infrastructure, raided police stations and opened fire at the main international airport, forcing it to shut down for nearly three months. Gunmen also stormed into Haiti’s two biggest prisons, freeing thousands of inmates.
With Haitian authorities unable to deal with the chaos, a U.N.-backed police force from Kenya arrived in June to lead a multinational mission, nearly two years after Haiti’s government requested urgent deployment of a foreign force.
In the police video, a narrator says the investigation in the case is ongoing: “Whoever is involved in the killings, your turn will come up. You will be arrested.”
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Paul Whelan, freed in prisoner swap with Russia, tells other American detainees: “We’re coming for you”
Washington — Nearly seven weeks after the Russians handed over Paul Whelan on a tarmac in Ankara, Turkey, the Marine veteran stood on the steps of the U.S. Capitol with a message for other Americans who are held abroad.
“We’re coming for you,” he told reporters Tuesday night after he met with lawmakers. “It might take time, but we’re coming.”
Whelan said he spoke with lawmakers about how the government can better support detainees after they’re released.
“We spoke about how the next person’s experience could be better,” he said. “What the government could do for the next person that’s held hostage and comes home — the care and support that other people might need, especially people that are in a worse situation. There are people coming back that lived in the dirt without shoes for three years, people that were locked up in hideous conditions for 20 years. They need support.”
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The U.S. secured Whelan’s release in August in one of the largest prisoner swaps since the end of the Cold War. The complex deal came after months of sensitive negotiations between the U.S., Russia, Germany, Slovenia, Poland and Norway.
As part of the deal, Russia released 16 prisoners while the Western countries released eight Russians. Whelan was released alongside Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, Russian-American radio journalist Alsu Kurmasheva and Vladimir Kara-Murza, a U.S. green card holder and Kremlin critic.
Whelan, who had been the longest-held American detainee in Russia, was arrested in December 2018 when he traveled to the country to attend a friend’s wedding. He was convicted of espionage in a secret trial and sentenced to 16 years in prison in 2020.
Whelan, his family and the U.S. government vehemently denied that he was a spy and accused Russia of using him as a political pawn. The U.S. government considered him to be wrongfully detained, a rare designation that put more government resources toward securing his release.
But a deal to secure his freedom was long elusive. He remained behind bars as Russia freed Marine veteran Trevor Reed and women’s basketball star Brittney Griner — both of whom were detained after Whelan’s arrest — in prisoner swaps with the U.S.
The U.S. said it pushed for his inclusion in both exchanges, but Russia refused. It led to Whelan advocating for his own release from a remote prison camp, calling government officials and journalists to make sure that he wasn’t forgotten.
When the plane carrying Whelan, Gershkovish and Kurmasheva landed in Maryland on Aug. 1, Whelan was the first to disembark. He was greeted by President Biden, who gave Whelan his American flag pin, and Vice President Kamala Harris.
“Whether he likes it or not, he changed the world,” Rep. Haley Stevens, a Michigan Democrat, told reporters Tuesday.
Whelan’s case and his family’s constant pressure on the U.S. government brought more attention to the cases of Americans who are wrongfully detained by foreign governments.
Haley said Whelan is a reminder to other Americans considering traveling to Russia that “you have a target on your back.”
Whelan said it’s been an adjustment acclimating to life back in the U.S., especially learning the latest technology like his iPhone 15.
“I was in a really remote part of Russia,” he said. “We really didn’t have much. The conditions were poor. The Russians said the poor conditions were part of the punishment. And coming back to see this sort of thing now is a bit of a shock, but it’s a good shock.”