THE LUNCHBOX COMMANDOS
The Haiti gig was a lifeline to a half-dozen men: $10K up front, $20 at the back end. Not bad, for merc work: $2K a day for BYOG (bring your own gear) and the promise of an open-ended discussion on what might come next if things turned out well. The seven-man team all saw dollar signs in the new Haitian president’s desperation.
According to media reports, their first task as laid out by the Haitian businessmen was to provide a PSD (private security detail) to transfer $80 million left in a looted Venezuelan oil fund so a political rival couldn’t get his hands on it. Once these funds were secured, the next project would, allegedly, pay them to go after the leader of the riots. They had a plan for that. They’d “shake the tree.” Take out, shoot, or capture riot instigators and work their way to the top to find out who was behind the violence. They never got the chance.
BANKING ON IT
This story, at its simplest, began on the 17th of February during a noisy Sunday in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. Riots and looting had been ongoing for a week. The U.S. State Department warned Americans to stay away. Around 2 p.m., the three-car convoy moved up toward the main bank in Port-au-Prince and asked to be let in.
Inside the first vehicle was a well-known Haitian politician named Jean Fritz Jean-Louis. He ran the recent election campaign of newly installed President Jovenel Moise. Beside him was the head of the bank, who insisted to the guards they had important business. To anyone on this island, Sunday afternoon would
