Port-au-Prince — Thursday, Dominican news sites reported that gang members on the outskirts of the Haitian capital seized more than two dozen passengers off a bus arriving from the Dominican Republic. The owner of the bus company, Roosevelt Jean-Francois, told Haitian media that police were unable to confirm how many of the 37 passengers were taken hostage. However, Dominican newspapers quoted the neighboring country’s defense ministry as saying that the driver had returned across the border with a harrowing account of how he and a handful of others escaped the gang.
On Wednesday at approximately 2:30 p.m. local time, gunmen intercepted a Capital Coach Line bus, a Haitian national police official told AFP on condition of anonymity.
The truck and at least seven of its occupants were found, according to law enforcement officials. However, the driver was abducted by the bandits.
Haiti is left without elected representatives, resulting in a political vacuum. 06:24
Jean-Francois said that a bus driver was hurt in the attack. This information generally confirmed the version of events published by the Dominican newspaper Listin Diario, which cited the country’s Ministry of Defense as saying Thursday that the driver had been apprehended at a border crossing earlier that day.
The driver, identified as 32-year-old Johan Antonio de la Rosa, allegedly informed authorities that the group pushed him, a female conductor, and passengers into another car. According to the defense ministry’s account, the car ran out of gas, and de la Rosa, the conductor, and a few of Haitian passengers fled.
According to Listin Diario, the two employees made it to an office of the bus firm in Haiti before the driver was returned to the border crossing.
The claim that the female conductor was shot during the escape has not been corroborated by Haitian officials. She was given emergency care by first responders before being taken to a hospital in Haiti for further care. Friday, her status was unclear.
The Haitian newspaper Le Nouvelliste said that a total of nine passengers evaded their kidnappers, but it was unclear on Friday whether any of them were still at large. There was also no additional information regarding the fate of the more than two dozen people believed to have been taken by the gang.
In recent years, powerful criminal gangs have begun robbing cargo convoys and kidnapping captives along the highway between Port-au-Prince and the Dominican border.
Haitians wait at an immigration office in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, on January 10, 2023, to apply for a passport. Under a new U.S. immigration program, Haitians seeking to escape poverty and despair have come to government offices in hopes of obtaining a passport and possibly a visa to live in the United States. RICHARD PIERRIN/AFP/Getty
In May of 2022, members of a gang stole a bus belonging to another company operating between Santo Domingo and Port-au-Prince. Passengers, including eight teenage Turkish nationals, were held captive by armed men for more than a month before being released.
As a result of the death of President Jovenel Moise in July 2021, the country has rapidly descended into a full security vacuum, with gangs controlling vast swaths of territory, including the capital Port-au-Prince, and the government appearing unable to respond.
The de facto president, Ariel Henry, is governing without a legal mandate since the security situation has rendered it difficult to organize long-overdue elections, leaving the nation’s congress with virtually no sitting representatives.
On January 9, 2023, in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Haitian Senator Patrice Dumont holds a press conference at the conclusion of his term
Patrice Dumont, one of ten senators who left their posts this month upon the expiration of their respective terms, told NPR this week, “It’s a collapse
»Haitian gang abducts bus passengers, some manage a terrifying escape«