On Friday, the authorities announced that more than 400 prisoners are wanted by the police in Haiti, after their escape Thursday, during which 25 people were killed, including the director of the prison located on the outskirts of the capital.
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Before yesterday’s accident, there were 1,542 prisoners in Croix-de-Bouquet prison. On Friday afternoon, Minister of State for Communications, Frantz Exantus, announced at a press conference in Port-au-Prince that the count taken on Friday morning showed us that 1125 prisoners were in the cells.
“Twenty-five people were killed, including six prisoners, and the division inspector Paul Hector Joseph, who was in charge of the prison,” added Mr. Exantos.
The government representative expressed his regret, “among the dead were ordinary citizens who were killed by prisoners while fleeing.”
One of the prisoners who died as a result of the escape, gang leader Arnel Joseph was shot dead on Friday during a police check 120 km north of Croix-de-Bouquet prison, from which he escaped the day before.
Arnelle Joseph was killed while attacking a police patrol that stopped the motorcycle he was on. The police responded and Arnelle Joseph died, “Mr. Exantus said.
Accused of being the head of one of the main criminal networks in Haiti, Arnel Joseph was arrested in July 2019.
He had tried, unsuccessfully, for the first time from Croix-de-Bouquet prison in July 2020, an escape that was announced via a video clip posted on social media a few days before the attempt.
While serving his sentence for the murder, Arnelle Joseph had already twice escaped from another prison, in Port-au-Prince, in 2010 and 2017.
Croix-des-Bouquets high-security prison, built with funding from Canada, was opened in 2012 and has a maximum capacity of 872 inmates, although nearly twice as many were still being held there on Thursday.
