21471: (Chamberlain) Notorious Haiti rebel leader to surrender, says lawyer (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Greg Chamberlain <GregChamberlain@compuserve.com>

     By Joseph Guyler Delva

     PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti, April 21 (Reuters) - A former death squad chief
who helped lead a bloody rebellion that drove Haitian President
Jean-Bertrand Aristide into exile will surrender to police on Thursday, his
lawyer said on Wednesday.
     Louis Jodel Chamblain, who was convicted in absentia in 1995 of the
murder of a prominent businessman, will put himself in the hands of the
Haitian justice system, attorney Stanley Gaston told reporters after a
meeting with police officials.
     "Tomorrow, Chamblain will surrender to the police, hoping justice will
be done," Gaston said.
     At his side, Chamblain said: "My decision is made and tomorrow I will
explain it."
     Human rights groups had expressed concern a convicted killer and human
rights abuser could walk Haiti's streets freely, as Chamblain has done
since joining the rebellion that pushed Aristide out of power on Feb. 29.
     Chamblain signed autographs for admirers in the capital,
Port-au-Prince, in the chaotic days after Aristide's government collapsed,
when armed gangs ruled and police were nowhere to be seen.
     An army officer accused of heading death squads during the last years
of the Duvalier family dictatorship in the 1980s, Chamblain helped form the
Front for the Advancement of Progress of the Haitian People, or FRAPH,
after a military junta ousted Aristide in 1991 during his first presidency.
     FRAPH was blamed for 3,000 deaths in the three years Aristide was in
exile.
     In 1995, Chamblain was convicted of the 1993 murder of Antoine Izmery,
an Aristide supporter who was dragged from a church, forced to kneel and
shot in the head.
     Chamblain returned from exile in the neighboring Dominican Republic in
February, shortly after armed gangs and former soldiers began an uprising
in northern Haiti. He helped lead the rebel forces that ultimately forced
Aristide to flee.
     The pledge to give himself up came after a meeting between rebel
leaders, Haitian National Police Chief Leonce Charles, Justice Minister
Bernard Gousse and representatives of the multinational force sent to Haiti
to provide security.
     Charles said police had formulated a plan to take Chamblain into
custody. But he said he was pleased the surrender would avoid any possible
violence from the armed rebels.
     "Chamblain will go back to where he should be (prison)," he said.
"It's up to the justice system to decide this case."
     Wynter Etienne, a leader of the rebels in Gonaives, the cradle of the
rebellion, said Jean Pierre Baptiste, another notorious FRAPH member better
known by his alias "Jean Tatoune," would also surrender to police. He did
not say when.
     Tatoune was convicted in the 1994 Raboteau massacre, when FRAPH forces
went on a rampage in a seaside slum in Gonaives and killed more than two
dozen people.