22979: Chamberlain: Haiti-Rebel Trial (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Greg Chamberlain <GregChamberlain@compuserve.com>

   By AMY BRACKEN

   PORT-AU-PRINCE, Aug 17 (AP) -- A jury acquitted former paramilitary
leader Louis-Jodel Chamblain of murder charges Tuesday after a secretive
trial in the middle of the night, angering human rights groups who blamed
the country's U.S.-backed government.
   Chamblain and co-defendent Jackson Joanis were acquitted just after dawn
in the 1993 murder of Antoine Izmery, a former justice minister and
financier of former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, according to Stanley
Gaston, an attorney for Chamblain.
   Eight witnesses were called by the prosecution, but only one showed up,
saying he knew nothing about the case, according to Viles Alizar, with the
National Coalition for Haitian Rights. For the defense, two showed up, but
offered few details of the case, he said.
   "It is really terrible," Alizar said of the acquittal.
   Both defendants still face further murder trials: Chamblain for several
killings in a pro-Aristide stronghold of northern Gonaives in 1994, and
Joanis for the killing of a pro-Aristide priest, Rev. Jean-Marie Vincent,
the same year.
   It could be another month before the pair's next trial, Gaston said.
   The interim justice minister, Bernard Gousse, has said Chamblain might
be pardoned of any convictions because of "his great services to the
nation," pointing to his help in ousting Aristide this year.
   Chamblain led a paramilitary group blamed for killing some 3,000 people
from 1991 -- when Aristide was first ousted -- to 1994 -- when Aristide was
restored by U.S. troops. Chamblain went into exile in the Dominican
Republic at the time.
   He returned to help lead the rebellion this year that ousted Aristide
for a second time and sent him into exile. Human rights groups have
criticized Haiti's U.S.-backed interim government for forming alliances
with people like Chamblain while it arrests Aristide officials and
supporters.
   "For the defense, this has been a great success," Gaston, Chamblain's
attorney, said of the acquittal in the Izmery case.
   Chamblain was convicted in absentia in 1995 and given two life sentences
for his alleged role in the Izmery assassination and the 1994 Gonaives
killings. Haitian law provides that people judged in their absence have a
right to a new trial if they return.
   Chamblain led a band of rebels during a bloody revolt that began Feb. 5
in the northern city of Gonaives. After a three-week rebellion, Aristide
was pushed from power Feb. 29.
   Chamblain claims Aristide ordered his henchmen to kill his pregnant wife
in 1991 and told The Associated Press during the revolt that he would do
the same to Aristide given the chance.