The USA provided a $5 million reward on Tuesday for the arrest of Haitian gang chief Jimmy “Barbeque” Cherizier for allegedly violating US sanctions.
Cherizier, 48, and one other man, Bazile Richardson, have been indicted on costs of conspiring to switch funds from the USA to fund gang actions in Haiti, the Justice Division stated.
“There is a good purpose that there is a $5 million reward for info resulting in Cherizier’s arrest,” US Legal professional Jeanine Pirro stated at a press convention.
“He is a gang chief chargeable for heinous human rights abuses, together with violence in opposition to Americans in Haiti.”
Cherizier has been underneath US Treasury Division sanctions since 2020 and UN sanctions since 2022.
The previous policeman heads an alliance of gangs in Haiti dubbed the “G9 Household,” whose members are accused of homicide, theft, extortion, rape, focused assassinations, drug trafficking and kidnappings.
The alliance participated in an organised assault final yr that in the end led to the resignation of Prime Minister Ariel Henry, who was changed by a frail transitional council.
The Justice Division stated that Cherizier and Richardson, a naturalised US citizen who was arrested in Texas final month, raised funds from members of the Haitian diaspora in the USA and had the cash transferred to intermediaries within the Caribbean nation.
Cherizier allegedly used the funds to pay salaries to members of his gang and buy firearms.
Haiti is the poorest nation within the Western hemisphere, with swaths of the nation and the overwhelming majority of the capital, Port-au-Prince, underneath the management of armed gangs.
Regardless of the deployment of a Kenyan-led multinational power to again up Haiti’s police, violence has continued to soar.
No less than 3,141 individuals have been killed within the first half of this yr, in accordance with figures launched final month by the UN Excessive Commissioner for Human Rights.
“Cherizier and (Richardson) sought to lift funds in the USA to bankroll Cherizier’s violent prison enterprise, which is driving a safety disaster in Haiti,” Assistant Legal professional Normal John Eisenberg stated.
“The Nationwide Safety Division doesn’t tolerate prison gang fundraising in the USA, and can proceed to pursue those that allow Haiti’s violence and instability.”
