Haitian Justice

What follows is a primer on the Haitian justice system I wrote for the HURAH website. Thought it might be helpful here as well to explain things.

In other news, the official election results are slow to be announced, though everyoone knows who won. A demonstration downtown today to demand an official anouncment.

The election process has stalled and overshadowed the human rights delegation to Cite Solei, so they press confrence and report has still not been officially anounced. Hope to get that ball rolling this week.

A Brief Introduction to the Haitian Criminal Justice System, Both in Theory and Reality.

In my time in Haiti so far, now three weeks and counting, that in order to fully comprehend the significance of AUMOHD’s work and challenges faced not only by its staff, but by the entire Haitian people, it is important to have some understanding of the Haitian criminal justice system, as it exists both in theory and reality.
First off, until the recent elections, the sitting government was one without a constitutional basis or authority. To compound the issue, the United Nations peacekeeping force, MINUSTAH, had the unclear mandate only to support the Haitian government. So even before we get started, understand we exist in a very gray area where rule of law is concerned.
Most cases referred to AUMOHD have some element of the following: a person is arrested by MINUSTAH troops, often after being singled out by a masked informant as a “bandit” though the informant may or may not be from the actual community and on more than one case has been accused of being a bandit or thief himself. The arrested person is then given over to the Haitian National Police, as the UN troops cannot hold prisoners. So an interesting situation arises where the UN claims no right to free or intercede on behalf of a prisoner and claims to only be doing what they were told in arresting them in the first place. The police for their part say they didn’t arrest them, have no problem with them specifically, but can not simply free them as they didn’t make the arrest and lack the authority. A vicious circle lacking accountability but rife with opportunity for enterprising judges and police within the system.
In theory, police must observe a crime or else obtain a warrant to make a lawful arrest, and an arrested person is entitled to a lawyer and a court appearance and a trial, as in most countries. It is however more complicated than that, as even under Haitian law, it is required that the accused pay the cost of transcripts and documents being copied and delivered, judge’s travel expenses, and so on. All things that are covered under the American justice system become the burden of the arrested. This does not even begin to cover the costs of the grease, the palm money that makes things happen in a country where no one can remember if it is legal or not, it is so ingrained in the culture and the way of doing business. Then there are the bribes, the money demanded by judges and attorneys and policemen to make a family member free. Add these costs, both the normal legal ones, the normal illegal ones, and the many that fall into the gray area of custom, and it becomes clear why so many of the accused stay in jail so long, based not on guilt or innocence, but on having money or not.
A few case studies may make the issue clearer. One woman told us about her son, arrested three times by the police and each time they demanded money for his release and each time she paid it, until arrested a final time she could not afford his “bail” and so he remains in jail, as ever without a charge or warrant against him. Another woman told of her husband’s arrest; when she went to see a judge he demanded $2,800 Haitian dollars for his release. She paid it but her husband still has not been released. A director of an orphanage in lower Port-au-Prince tells me he has spent the last several Christmases in jail, because the police know that his donors send more money around the holidays and they can extract more from him at that time.
Now, the case of a man arrested for kidnapping. A genuine bandit, he too had to face Haitian “justice” and pay off his captors: the police. So his friends kidnapped someone else and used the ransom money to pay his “bail”. If one side wasn’t wearing uniforms you’d never be able to keep straight who the real kidnappers are.
Now, we have had elections and are hopefully moving forward in the direction of progress and respect for the rule of law. To that end, AUMOHD seeks to work according to legal procedure and constitutional framework. No bribes are paid here, though a little palm grease and the pulled strings of a few friends would certainly be easier, and faster. But as AUMOHD’s mission is bigger than any one prisoner, it includes fostering that sense of respect for the rule of law that has been so long absent from the country.