A former Colombian soldier will appear in United States federal court following the murder of Haitian President Jovenel Moise on July 7, 2021. Mario Antonio Palacios Palacios had just been deported from Jamaica when he was intercepted on Monday , in Panama.
A former Colombian soldier was indicted on Tuesday, January 4, 2022, in the United States, for his alleged participation in the assassination of the Haitian president, announced the United States Department of Justice.
Mario Antonio Palacios Palacios, 43, is accused of being part of the group of around 20 men who killed Jovenel Moïse and seriously injured his wife, in his presidential residence, in Port-au-Prince, on the 7th July 2021.
He was arrested Monday in Panama during a stopover on a flight from Jamaica, where he had taken refuge after the assassination; he was then trying to reach Colombia, his country of origin.
The same evening, he was extradited to Miami, where he was due to appear in court on Tuesday.
He faces life imprisonment, the justice ministry said in a statement.
American justice does not plan to extradite this man to Haiti, which does not seem to have the necessary means, to deal with this case.
According to the US federal police, Mario Palacios was recruited in June 2021 to arrest and kidnap the Haitian president.
The plan would then have changed and the group, under the leadership of a man identified as “Co-conspirator Number 1”, would have been tasked with killing Jovenel Moïse. This man, with dual Haitian and American nationality, is in detention in Haiti.
After the assassination, the Colombian fled to Jamaica, where he had been arrested and he had collaborated with American investigators, before being deported on Monday to Colombia.
But intercepted in Panama, the former soldier, subject to a red notice from Interpol for “murder and complicity in murder“, a “accepted voluntary extradition“to the United States and boarded a flight to Miami on Monday evening, according to the head of the Panamanian migration services, Samira Gozaine.
More than forty people, including 18 Colombians and Americans of Haitian origin, have already been arrested, as part of the investigation into the murder of Jovenel Moïse, committed at his home, without any police officer from his close security. be hurt.
The assassination of the president has left the poverty, insecurity and corruption ridden Caribbean country even more uncertain.
The Prime Minister, Ariel Henry, who is in charge of the management of current affairs, denounced an assassination attempt against him, during the celebrations of the national day, Saturday January 1, 2022.
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