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Richard
Patterson for The New York Times "I am fighting to get
justice. Not just for Jean, but the country we fought
for." MICHELE MONTAS
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THE Haitian government wants Michèle
Montas to believe
that common criminals killed her husband, Jean Dominique.
Never mind that he was the country's most famous
journalist and fiercest critic of government corruption. Never
mind that President Jean-Bertrand Aristide and several government
ministers reportedly huddled with the investigating judge
before indictments were issued on Monday. Never mind that
someone tried to kill Ms. Montas herself on Christmas Day,
forcing her to silence Radio Haïti-Inter, the station
that she and her husband had run since the
1970's.
In the through-the-looking-glass world of Haitian
justice, the indictment did not identify whoever ordered the
April 3, 2000, assassination of Mr. Dominique. It did not
indicate a motive for why he was shot seven times, nor for
a series of other killings linked to the case. It merely named
the same six men — ex-convicts and former policemen —
who have been imprisoned for the crime for the last two years,
and who Ms. Montas says were just the shooter and his accomplices.
Ms. Montas, a veteran of the "risky business"
of journalism in Haiti, where dozens of reporters have
had to flee into exile, had long feared a whitewash. But not
one this brazen. Until she knows who ordered the shooting,
she will stay in exile in New York, filing appeals from afar.
"We've had at least five people die in
this case," she said. "One suspect was lynched,
another disappeared. The judge is in exile in Miami. How can
they say that they cannot identify a brain behind this. Maybe
the word brain is too strong. Maybe I should say the money."
Easy money from drugs, sweetheart deals or old-fashioned
corruption drives much of Haiti these
days, Ms. Montas charges, while Mr. Aristide and his Lavalas
party offer no solutions and empty words.
A homecoming queen turned crusading journalist,
she is tall and elegant. Her hair pulled back smartly, she
looks you straight in the eye. On her blouse is a button with
Jean's smiling visage. It reads, "Jean
Dominique is Alive in Every Grain of Rice." The sentiment
is both symbolic and literal: he worked for
years with peasant groups, and his ashes were scattered in
the waters that feed the Artibonite
Valley, once Haiti's breadbasket.
Her anger at how things went so wrong does not
come from some middle-class fear of the impoverished Haitian
masses, but from a deep sense of betrayal by Mr. Aristide.
She and her husband, like many Haitians, were inspired by
the former Roman Catholic priest, and hoped democracy would
flourish in their country after the departure in 1986 of President
for LifeJean-Claude Duvalier, known as Baby Doc.
"It was unthinkable this would happen under
Lavalas, a party Jean worked to put in power," she said.
"Wethought things would change for participation and
transparency. In fact, nothing has changed and
impunity reigns. In fact, it is reinforced by the apparent
inability of the president to control theviolence."
THE violence that has plagued Haiti through much of its 200
years touched her privileged upbringing when François
Duvalier, known as Papa Doc, consolidated his dictatorial
rule in the late 1950's. She was the comfortable daughter
of two university professors, and she was angry at the repression
sweeping through her country that claimed the lives of an
aunt and several cousins.
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