Report No. 26 (2010) IACHR. Petition No. 12.100 (Haiti)

• Year: 2010
• Report Number: 26
• Petition Number: 12.100
• Case Type: Archive
• Alleged Victim: Frantz Henri Jean-Louis y Thomas Asabath
• Respondent State: Haiti
• Court: Inter-American Comission of Human Rights

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REPORT Nº 26/10

PETITION 12.100

DECISION TO ARCHIVE

HAITI

March 16, 2010

ALLEGED VICTIMS: Frantz Henri Jean-Louis and Thomas Asabath

PETITIONERS: Jean-Claude Nord and Gérard Georges

INITIATION OF PROCESSING: December 22, 1998

ALLEGED VIOLATIONS: The alleged facts concern violations of Articles 1(1), 7, 8 and 25 of the American Convention on Human Rights (the “American Convention”)

1. POSITION OF THE PETITIONERS

1. On December 22, 1998, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (the “Inter-American Commission” or the “IACHR”) received a petition from Gérard Georges, lawyer and President of the Haitian-American League of Human Rights, and Jean-Claude Nord, lawyer and Secretary of the Haitian Center for Human Rights (the “petitioners”), against the Republic of Haiti (the “State” or “Haiti”), alleging violations of the American Convention for the illegal arrest of Frantz Henry Jean-Louis and Thomas Asabath (the “alleged victims”) on July 23, 1998, without warrant of arrest and without having been surprised in the act of committing a criminal offense (“flagrante delicto”), as well as their illegal detention first in the Pétion-Ville police station and subsequently in the Pétion-Ville civil prison.

2. Further, the petitioners allege that despite an order declaring “their arrest illegal and their detention abusive and arbitrary” issued on August 5, 1998, the Government Commissioner refused to liberate Messrs. Jean-Louis and Asabath until October 9, 1998. Nonetheless, the petitioners assert that as soon as the alleged victims were released, they were brutally arrested again, this time pursuant to a warrant of arrest, of which they were not informed, with the charge of “narcotic trafficking in the Haitian territory”.

3. The petitioners indicate that on November 30, 1998, the examining magistrate in charge of the case issued a release order. However, they allege that on the very same day the State Secretary of Public Security called the examining magistrate to his office, as well as the Government Commissioner, to order them not to comply with the release order. By doing so, the petitioners claim that the State Secretary deliberately acted against constitutional and legal principles as well as against fundamental norms and principles contained in international human rights instruments ratified by the State of Haiti, including the American Convention.

II. POSITION OF THE STATE

4. The State has not presented any response to the facts alleged by the petitioners, nor has it questioned the...