A routine patrol in Haiti’s northwestern waters erupted into deadly violence Sunday when police intercepted what authorities are calling the country’s most significant drug bust in nearly a decade.
The operation left three Jamaican nationals dead and resulted in the seizure of more than 1,000 kilograms of cocaine with an estimated U.S. street value of $32 million.
The dramatic confrontation unfolded near Île de la Tortue, a small island off Haiti’s northwest coast that has become a notorious waystation for Caribbean drug trafficking routes.
What began as surveillance of suspicious vessels quickly escalated into a firefight that would claim three lives and deal a significant blow to regional narcotics operations.
“There were two people who died at sea in an exchange of gunfire, and there was another who did not die on the spot but died later,” confirmed Jeir Pierre, the government prosecutor for Port-de-Paix, in an interview with the Miami Herald. The prosecutor’s matter-of-fact tone belied the significance of an operation that represents both a major victory and a sobering reminder of the violence that permeates Caribbean drug trafficking.
According to Pierre, all three deceased suspects were Jamaican nationals, while a fourth individual—a Bahamian national who was wounded during the firefight—remains in custody at a local hospital.
Haitian police have identified one of the deceased as Jimmy Antony, though the names of the other suspects have not been released pending ongoing investigations.
