Month: November 2021

Two of the 17 people taken hostage in Haiti last month have been freed, their church organization said Sunday. According to the Ohio-based Christian Aid Ministries, both members are “safe” and “in good spirits,” No further information, including the identities of those freed or how their release was secured, was given. The church group said: “While we rejoice at this release, our hearts are with the fifteen people who are still being held.”  The FBI, which is helping Haitian authorities recover the captives, declined to comment.

The missionaries were kidnapped by the ‘400 Mawozo’ gang on Oct. 16. There are five children in the group of 16 U.S. citizens and one Canadian, including an 8-month-old. Their Haitian driver also was abducted, according to a local human rights organization. The leader of the 400 Mawozo gang has threatened to kill the hostages unless his demands are met. Authorities have said the gang was demanding $1 million per person, although it wasn’t immediately clear that included the children in the group.

The release comes as Haiti has seen a spike in gang-related violence and kidnappings. The U.S. government recently urged U.S. citizens to leave Haiti, and on Friday, Canada announced it was pulling all but essential personnel from its embassy. Haiti also is trying to recover from the July 7 assassination of President Jovenel Moise and a 7.2 magnitude earthquake that struck in mid-August, killing more than 2,200 people and destroying tens of thousands of homes.

Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt granted Julius Jones clemency ahead of his scheduled execution Thursday, commuting his sentence to life without parole following public outcry based on doubts over whether he committed the 1999 murder for which he was convicted.  The last-minute executive order by Gov. Stitt came mere hours before Jones was scheduled to be executed, and follows public outcry among advocacy groups, on social media, and from celebrities like Kim Kardashian West, a prominent criminal justice advocate who called Jones’ case a “tragic miscarriage of justice.”  Several other celebrities joined in calls for his clemency, including NBA players Blake Griffin, Trae Young and Russell Westbrook, and rappers Common and J Cole.  Criminal justice advocacy groups have criticized the court’s handling of the case, claiming jurors had shown signs of racial bias and that prosecutors had withheld crucial evidence.

Oklahoma’s Pardon and Parole Board recommended Jones’ sentence be commuted in September, and again voted for clemency earlier this month, voicing doubts about his guilt in the crime.  Governor Stitt said in a statement he commuted Jones’ sentence “after prayerful consideration and reviewing materials presented by all sides of this case.” As a condition of granting clemency, Stitt ordered that Jones will never be eligible to apply or be considered for parole, pardon or commutation for the rest of his life.  Jones’ attorney, Amanda Bass, said in a statement his legal team had hoped Stitt would adopt the board’s full recommendation to grant him the possibility of parole, but she added they are grateful “the governor has prevented an irreparable mistake.”

Jones has maintained his innocence for decades. He was sentenced to death in 2002 after he was found guilty of killing Paul Howell in a suburb of Oklahoma City.  Criminal justice advocates have criticized Jones’ legal team for failing to present his alibi during the trial, and have argued that racial discrimination played a role in his conviction.

Travis McMichael returned to the witness stand on Thursday, and under cross-examination from the prosecutor repeated that Ahmaud Arbery never verbally threatened him or pulled a weapon on him during the five minutes he, his father and their neighbor chased Arbery before the 35-year-old McMichael fatally shot him.  Travis McMichael, his 65-year-old father, Gregory McMichael, and their neighbor, William “Roddie” Bryan, 53, have pleaded not guilty to charges of murder, aggravated assault and criminal attempt to commit false imprisonment.

Prosecutor Linda Dunikoski attempted to get McMichael to concede to inconsistencies between what he told police the day of the shooting and what he told the Brunswick, Georgia, jury during his direct testimony on Wednesday. McMichael acknowledged that in none of his statements did he tell police that he and his father were attempting to make a citizens’ arrest of Arbery. He also conceded that he had suspected another individual of stealing a pistol from his truck on Jan. 1, 2020, and that he had also surmised that person, not Arbery, was the one responsible for a spike in crime in his Satilla Shores neighborhood near Brunswick.

During his direct testimony on Wednesday, Travis McMichael testified that he walked out of his house with his shotgun and saw a neighbor pointing in his direction as if signaling where he saw the young Black man running. He testified on Thursday that at no time did he go and speak to the neighbor about what had occurred before he and his father jumped in his truck with their guns and set out after Arbery.  He said he drove close enough to Arbery on three separate occasions to ask him to stop running so he could speak to him, but in each instance, Arbery kept running, never said a word to him and altered his course in an apparent attempt to get away from the McMichaels.

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