President Jovenel Moïse’s terrified daughter Jomarlie hid in a bedroom as the ‘foreign mercenaries’ ransacked the home, leaving her father in a pool of blood at the private residence in the hills above Port-au-Prince

President Jovenel Moïse, 53, was shot dead in a raid on his private residence in the early hours of June 7

Govt. officials said the president was riddled with 12 bullet holes and his eye had been ‘gouged out’ as it emerges his terrified daughter hid in her bedroom to escape from assassins who shouted ‘DEA operation’

He was killed as the country was embroiled in economic stagnation and political turmoil after what many in the country saw as his naked power grab and his bid to perpetuate himself in power

Moïse was accused of turning the country into a dictatorship after failing to hold elections at the end of his tenure, as he churned through seven prime ministers in four years, seeking a deputy answerable to him alone

First Lady Martine Moïse, 47, shot through the legs, arm, torso and hand, and was later airlifted in ‘critical condition’ to hospital in Miami’

Interim Prime Minister Joseph Claude, has assumed sole power of the country, declaring a ‘state of siege’ granting him absolute authority

Joseph has said he has the situation in hand but there are fears that the country will fall into utter chaos after months of protests against Moise

The gunmen who shouted ‘DEA operation’ as they burst in, pretended they were officers of the US Drugs Enforcement Administration, speaking in English and Spanish

PM Joseph said some of the gang are believed to be from Columbia and Venezuela

Police chief Leon Charles said seven ‘mercenaries’ were killed as they tried flee the scene and seven others, including two American citizens, have been arrested

Multiple suspects, some hiding in bushes, were snatched off the street by an angry mob before being taken into police custody.

US citizen James Solages and another unidentified Haitian-American have been nabbed said cops were ‘battling’ commandos throughout Wednesday and vowed to stop all those responsible

The president of Haiti was found riddled with 12 bullet holes and had an eye gouged out when assassins with high-powered rifles raided his mansion, leaving his wife seriously wounded, in the early hours of Wednesday. 
Jovenel Moïse’s terrified adult daughter Jomarlie hid in a bedroom as the ‘foreigners’ ransacked his office and rooms, firing machine guns and leaving the 53-year-old to die an horrific death, lying in a pool of a blood at the private residence in the hills above Port-au-Prince. 
A maid and another servant were tied up by the gunmen who had shouted ‘DEA operation’ as they burst in, pretending they were officers of the US Drugs Enforcement Administration, speaking in English and Spanish.
First Lady Martine Moïse, 47, was shot through the legs, arm, torso and hand, and was later airlifted in a ‘critical condition’ to a hospital in Miami, Florida. 
Martine Moïse last night was described as ‘out of danger’ and in a ‘stable condition’ by Prime Minister Joseph Claude, who has assumed sole power of the country, declaring a ‘state of siege’ granting him absolute authority.

Addressing the media Police chief, Leon Charles, announced that four ‘mercenaries’ were shot dead as they tried flee the scene of the attack, while another two are in custody, later updated to six in custody. Law enforcement the chief said, were ‘battling’ with commandos throughout Wednesday, with some of his officers at one point being taken hostage before being freed.
Two Haitian-Americans are among at least seven people arrested in the assassination, reports said Thursday — as multiple suspects were snatched off the street by an angry mob before being taken into police custody.
US citizen James Solages and another unidentified Haitian-American have been nabbed in the nation-rocking assassination, Mathias Pierre, Haiti’s minister of elections and inter-party relations, told outlets including the Associated Press.

In an online profile for a charity he serves as president of the board of directors, Solages is described as a “building engineer,” “certified diplomatic agent” and former “chief commander of body-guards for The Canadian embassy in Haiti.”
The charity is described as dedicated to promoting “the growth and development of underprivileged people” in Haiti and, particularly, the coastal town of Jacmel.

Charges against Solages and his fellow detainees were not immediately announced, and it was unclear whether Solages had a lawyer to speak on his behalf.
Pierre said that one of the other detainees is believed to be Haitian-American, but refused to divulge any further information about the accused.
National Police Director Léon Charles told Haiti’s Radio Métropole on Thursday that six people have been arrested and seven killed in gun battles with cops, though Pierre said the number of dead suspects stood at four.
Meanwhile Thursday, dozens of civilians in the capital city of Port-au-Prince grabbed some of the alleged killers in the street and roughed them up, telling journalists on the scene that they found the suspects hiding in bushes.
Police arrived to take control of the tense situation, hauling the men — caked in mud and sweating profusely — into the back of a pickup truck and driving off as the mob called for street justice.
“They killed the president! Give them to us,” some among the throng were heard chanting. “We’re going to burn them!”
Police arrived to take control of the tense situation, hauling the men — caked in mud and sweating profusely — into the back of a pickup truck and driving off as the mob called for street justice.
“They killed the president! Give them to us,” some among the throng were heard chanting. “We’re going to burn them!”

Some of the civilians were seen following the truck to a local police station, later setting fire to bullet-riddled cars they believed to belong to the suspects.
It was not immediately clear whether the two or more men seized by the mob were included in Charles’ tally of a half-dozen suspects in custody.
A squad of heavily armed killers described as “well-trained” foreign mercenaries stormed the president’s villa in the hills overlooking Port-au-Prince around 1 a.m. Wednesday, killing the 53-year-old Moïse and critically wounding First Lady, Martine Moïse, 47.
Officials have variously described the assassins as speaking English and Spanish — rather than French and Haitian Creole, typically spoken in the nation — and apparent video footage of the raid captured a man speaking into a megaphone in English with an American accent.
The death squad tried to pass themselves off as agents of the US Drug Enforcement Administration during the daring, dead-of-night hit.
Chief Charles said an unspecified number of attackers remained at large but vowed they ‘will be killed or arrested.’
Magistrate Carl Henry Destin told the Nouvelliste newspaper that the president’s body had been ripped apart by 12 bullets from large caliber rifles and smaller 9mm weapons, to the forehead, chest, hips and abdomen.
‘The president’s office and bedroom were ransacked. We found him lying on his back, blue pants, a white shirt smeared with blood, his mouth open, his left eye gouged out,’ he said.
Interim PM Joseph claims he has the situation in hand but the international community fears that the country will fall into utter chaos after months of protests against Moise, who was accused of turning the country into a dictatorship and allowing armed gangsters to roam the streets to prevent new elections.

The raid took place just after 1a.m. local time. Shell casings could be seen on the street outside as forensics experts combed the scene for evidence. A nearby car was peppered with bullet holes.
Moïse’s wife was first treated at a local hospital then rushed by air ambulance to the Ryder Trauma Center in Miami.
Their daughter Jomarlie was in the home during the attack but hid in a bedroom, Destin, the magistrate, said. He said a maid and another domestic staff member had been tied up by the commandos. 
Video taken over the city on Wednesday evening showed smoke rising from several locations and captured the sound of gunfire – thought it was unclear whether the shooting was related to the police operation or signaled that the impoverished, violence-wracked nation was plunging deeper into chaos. 

The assassination came amid political turmoil in Haiti with opponents of Moise trying to force him from office, claiming his five-year term has expired. Moise said back in February that he survived another assassination attempt, describing it as ‘a coup’. At least 23 people, including a top judge and police official, were arrested.
The country’s interim Prime Minister Claude Joseph has now declared a two-week ‘state of siege’ imposing martial law, halting all flights out of Port-Au-Prince and sealing the country’s borders, while neighboring Dominican Republic mobilized its military to guard Haiti’s only land border.
Bocchit Edmond, the Haitian ambassador to the United States, described the assassins as ‘foreign mercenaries and professional killers,’ and PM Joseph said some of the gang are believed to be from Columbia and Venezuela.
Haiti’s Police Chief Léon Charles said late Wednesday that three police officers had been taken hostage by the suspected assassins, but were safely rescued after a police shootout with the suspects.  
It followed a tense day of uncertainty and chaos for millions of Haitians, with no presidential succession plan in place, and the fraught security situation leaving the streets of Port-Au-Prince deserted as millions sheltered in their homes and waited for any news updates. 

Pictures emerged of the gravely injured First Lady, Martine Moïse, arriving at Miami’s Fort Lauderdale Executive Airport, around 3.30pm on Wednesday. She was then transported to Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami for medical treatment. Officials said her vital signs were stable but her condition was critical.
The First Lady reportedly, sustained gunshot wounds to her arms and thigh, along with unspecified but severe injuries to her abdomen and hand.
Condemning the killing US President Joe Biden said ‘We are shocked and saddened to hear of the horrific assassination of President Jovenel Moise and the attack on First Lady Martine Moise,’ the US President said in a statement. ‘We condemn this heinous act and I am sending my sincere wishes for First Lady Moise’s recovery.’
Speaking to reporters as he left for a trip to Chicago, Biden called the incident ‘very worrisome’. 
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke to Haiti’s interim prime minister on Wednesday and voiced commitment to work with the Haitian government for peace and security, the State Department said.
The UN Security Council holding an emergency meeting on Thursday to discuss the situation, issued a statement expressing ‘deep concern regarding deteriorating political, security and humanitarian conditions in Haiti.

Interim Prime Minister Claude Joseph seized control of the country for the time being with the backing of the police and military, but Haiti has no legal framework for presidential succession. The issue of the succession chain bubbled up after a day of fast-moving developments in which Interim Prime Minister Joseph declared a ‘state of siege’ and locked down the country under military control and all flights in and out of the island nation were halted as police and military launched an all-out manhunt.   
Troops from the neighboring Dominica to the border with Haiti to boost security at all crossings
Haitian ambassador to the US said the assassins are believed to be ‘mercenaries’ and ‘well-trained killers’
US State Department dismissed any suggestion that assassins were actual DEA agents as ‘absolutely false’
Haitian ambassador also called the killers ‘fake DEA agents’ and said they were a band of hired ‘mercenaries’
He pleaded for security assistance from the United States and the United Nations 
Haiti now thrown into confusion about who is in charge with no legal framework for succession
There are just 10 elected officials in the country, all of them senators, and the legislature is defunct. 
Interim Prime Minister Joseph described the attack on the president and first lady as a ‘hateful, inhumane and barbaric act.’ 
‘My compatriots – remain calm because the situation is under control,’ Joseph said in a televised address to the nation, backed by a row of somber-faced officials. ‘This blow has wounded this country, this nation, but it will not go unpunished.’ 
The prime minister identified the assassins as ‘mercenaries’ believed to include Haitians and natives of Colombia and Venezuela, according to local reporter Alexander Gálvez, who spoke to Colombian radio station Blu Radio. 

The normally bustling streets of Port-au-Prince were deserted on Wednesday as police and military plunged the capital into lockdown. Gunfire rang out intermittently across the city, a grim reminder of the growing power of gangs that displaced more than 14,700 people last month alone as they torched and ransacked homes in a fight over territory.
Public transportation was scarce, as a few bands of locals braved venturing out in search of the few businesses that were for food and water.  
Analysts with knowledge of contemporary Haitian politics say there is a great possibility that restoring calm will require some form of foreign intervention with a U.N.-type military presence a possibility in the very explosive situation. With Gangs a force to contend with, it is not certain Haiti’s security forces can enforce a state of siege, they said.
The ability of Interim PM Claude Joseph to stitch the tattered political fabric and form a stable government remains a huge question. Conventional wisdom is that it will be very difficult for Joseph to hold the country together, unless he creates a government of national unity in short order.

The increasingly dire situation comes as Haiti is still trying to recover from the devastating 2010 earthquake and Hurricane Matthew in 2016 following a history of dictatorship and political upheaval. 
Haiti had grown increasingly unstable under Moïse, who had been ruling by decree for more than a year and faced violent protests as critics accused him of trying to amass more power while the opposition demanded he step down.
According to Haiti’s constitution, Moïse should be replaced by the president of Haiti’s Supreme Court, but the chief justice died in recent days from COVID-19, leaving open the question of who might rightfully succeed to the office.
Joseph, meanwhile, was supposed to be replaced by Ariel Henry, who had been named prime minister by Moïse a day before the assassination.
Henry told AP in a brief interview that he is the rightful prime minister, calling it an exceptional and confusing situation. 

In another interview with Radio Zenith, he said there was no fight between him and Interim PM Joseph, saying: ‘I only disagree with the fact that people have taken hasty decisions … when the moment demands a little more serenity and maturity.’
The attack on President Moise unfolded at around 1am on Wednesday, when a group of ‘foreigners’, some of whom spoke English and Spanish, broke into his home in the hills above Port-au-Prince, according to a statement by the French-speaking country’s prime minister. 
In footage purportedly recorded by a witness, someone with an American accent shouts into a megaphone: ‘DEA operation. Everybody stand down. DEA operation. Everybody back up, stand down.’ 
Gunfire then erupts in the video which was uploaded to Instagram by someone who says they were in the Pelerin 5 neighborhood, where the president’s house is located. Gunman spotted in the street outside the home of Haitian leader.

The assailants were pretending to be from the US Drugs Enforcement Agency (DEA) and were ‘mercenaries,’ a government source told The Miami Herald.
Officials in both Haiti and the US have dismissed any notion that the killers were actual DEA agents. US State Department spokesperson Ned Price said those claims were ‘absolutely false.’
President Moïse had been accused of turning Haiti into a dictatorship, refusing to relinquish the presidency after his term ended earlier this year, using armed thugs to spread fear and trying to change the constitution to consolidate power – including installing an intelligence agency that answered directly to him. 
He was killed a day after he nominated Ariel Henry, a neurosurgeon, as the new prime minister. Henry, the eighth PM in the last four years, was due to take over later this week from Joseph, who had been named as interim in April.   
Residents last night reported hearing high-powered rounds and saw men dressed in black sprinting through the neighborhood. There were also claims of a grenade going off and drones being deployed. 
Further videos purportedly taken by a neighbor show men with rifles arriving outside the president’s house. It is not clear whether they are from the country’s security forces or if they are the assassins.
PM Joseph, who earlier said he had taken charge of the country, declared a ‘state of siege’ on Wednesday which grants him additional powers.
‘I have just chaired an extraordinary council of ministers meeting and we have decided to declare a state of siege throughout the country,’ the prime minister said.
He said that the police and armed forces were taking ‘all measures to guarantee the continuity of the State and protect the Nation.’

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World leaders have condemned the assassination of Jovenel Moïse and warn more unrest could follow.
US President Joe Biden said Wednesday he was ‘shocked’ by the assassination of Haiti’s president and that ‘a lot’ more information is needed.
‘We are shocked and saddened to hear of the horrific assassination of President Jovenel Moise and the attack on First Lady Martine Moïse,’ Biden said in a statement.
‘We condemn this heinous act and I am sending my sincere wishes for First Lady Moise’s recovery,’ he added.
Speaking to reporters as he left for a trip to Chicago, Biden called the incident ‘very worrisome’ and said ‘we need a lot more information.’
Other world leaders who have spoken out against the leader’s assassination include Pope Francis, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez,  European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell, Colombian President Ivan Duque and Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen.. Haiti is one of the few countries in the world that maintain formal diplomatic relations with Taiwan, which China claims as its own.
The assassination of Moïse risks throwing the country into total disarray after months of violent demonstrations and claims that the president had used armed gangsters to stay in power.  More than 14,700 people have fled their homes due to the spate of killings.
The brutal assassination comes after President Moïse claimed police had foiled an assassination plot in February amid massive protests in the country over claims the president was acting like a dictator and refusing to hold elections. 
In response, the former auto parts dealer had 23 people arrested who he said were behind the plot including a top judge and a police officer. 
Haiti, a country of about 11 million people, that has struggled to achieve stability since the fall of the Duvalier dynastic dictatorship that held brutal sway for 30 years beginning in 1957, until Baby Doc Duvalier was chased into exile in 1986 awoke in shock at the news of the assassination on Wednesday.
The usually busy streets of Port-au-Prince were largely empty morning after. The country’s main airport, Toussaint Louverture International Airport, was closed except for diplomatic and humanitarian flights. 

Soaring inflation has contributed to instability, with consumer prices exploding 23 percent in May from a year ago, rocking the deeply impoverished country where where 60 percent of the population makes less than $2 a day. 
There are just 10 elected officials in the country and there is no legal framework for who should take power in the event of the president’s death. 
Some reports suggested that the next in line of succession should be the head of the country’s Supreme Court, but the incumbent judge died recently of Covid-19.
For acting PM Joseph to formally replace Moïse he would need the approval of Haiti’s parliament, but due to the lack of recent elections the legislature is effectively defunct.  
‘There is no constitutional answer to this situation,’ Bernard Gousse, a former justice minister and legal expert, told the Miami Herald.  
Meanwhile, the Dominican Republic ordered the ‘immediate closure’ of its land border with Haiti. The countries share a 240-mile frontier on the island of Hispaniola. Dominican President Luis Abinader condemned the assassination which he said ‘undermines the democratic order in Haiti and the region.’

Earlier this year, thousands took the streets of Port-Au-Prince to demand that president Moïse step down and hold elections amid his efforts to make sweeping changes to the constitution so that he could cling to power. The opposition point out that the president, who took power in 2017, should have left office on February 7. Moise had failed to hold elections the previous year as his term was ending. Moise claimed his five-year term was due to end in 2022, even as the United States and the United Nations disagreed with his efforts to change the country’s constitution, and called for a free and transparent election to be held by the end of 2021.
In a 2020 interview with the Telegraph Moïse defended himself against allegations of corruption and denied that he was turning the country in a dictatorship. 
‘We’re trying to find a solution to this crisis. I’m not the first president to rule by decree. And I’m confident that the answer is around the corner; then the legislature will be put in place to play its role.’

Moïse had also faced accusations of financial impropriety and power-grabbing by limiting powers for auditing government contracts and creating an intelligence agency that only answers to the president. 
He wanted to abolish the Senate, leaving a single legislative body, and replace the post of prime minister with a vice president who answered only to him, in a bid to streamline government. 
Swathes of the population deemed his rule illegitimate, and he churned through a series of seven prime ministers in four years. Most recently, Claude Joseph was supposed to be replaced this week by Ariel Henry after only three months in the post. 
Prime Minister designate, Ariel Henry, a 71-year-old neurosurgeon, has been part of Haiti’s coronavirus response and previously held posts in the government as interior minister, and social affairs and labor minister.
Henry is close to the opposition, but his appointment was not welcomed by the majority of opposition parties, who had continued to demand the president step down.