Death of former Haitian leader 'Baby Doc' Duvalier denies victims justice

When Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier made a surprise return to Haiti in 2011 after a quarter of a century in exile, some hoped the ageing dictator would finally have to answer for the abuses of his regime. During his 15-year rule, political leaders, journalists, human rights advocates - anyone seen as a threat to the self-proclaimed "president for life" - were detained, tortured and sometimes killed. He was accused of looting the nation's coffers and living like royalty in the hemisphere's poorest nation. Instead, as one human rights activist said following news of Duvalier's death on Saturday, he "cheated justice". Duvalier died of a heart attack on Saturday at his home in the mountaintop Port-au-Prince suburb of Thomassin, according to friends. He was 63. He had recently been discharged from hospital after being bitten on the leg by a tarantula. He was also a diabetic, according to a friend, and had been admitted to hospital several times since his return. His death ends a chapter in Haiti's tumultuous history, the last of a brutal family political dynasty that began when his father, Francois "Papa Doc" Duvalier, took power in 1957 and passed it to his 19-year-old son upon his death. The father died at age 64, also of a heart attack. "It's unfortunate he died in his bed, and we were unable to try him," said Michele Montas, a former Haitian journalist and victim of the regime. "For the people who fought against him, it's not over yet. It isn't just a fight against Jean-Claude, but the people who supported his administration." Patrick Gaspard, a Haitian-American and US ambassador to South Africa, reacted to the death over Twitter. "I'm thinking of the look in my mother's eyes when she talks about her brother, Joel, who was disappeared by the dictator," Gaspard tweeted. "News of the passing of Duvalier makes me honour my father and generations of Haitians who resisted that vicious dictatorship." While the tyrant reign of Papa Doc forced Haitians to flee by the planeload to New York, Paris and Montreal in the 1950s and 60s, the younger Duvalier's repression ushered in the "boat people". In the 1970s, Haitians began risking their lives on the high seas in search of safe harbour and better economic opportunities in the Bahamas, the Turks and Caicos Islands and Miami. "When we heard the news this morning it confirmed that he had been sick for a long time and it's interesting that he should die close to his father's age and of a heart attack," said Bernard Diederich, a New Zealand-born journalist who began covering Haiti in 1950 and interviewed Duvalier over four years for the book, l'Héritier (The Inheritor). "His death is another chapter," Diederich said. "Right up to recently, I received a call from a lawyer in Washington who was still working on putting him in prison for human rights violations. So those guys will now be able to retire their ticket and that is the end of that." Despite facing charges of crimes against humanity and illicit enrichment during his tumultuous 1971-1986 administration, Duvalier seemed to live a privileged existence during his final years in Haiti. He drove himself around town, was treated as a political celebrity and was often spotted at the city's posh restaurants. President Michel Martelly seemed to warm to the ageing dictator, appointing some of Duvalier's collaborators to his cabinet and inviting him to official presidential events. "On behalf of the entire government and the Haitian people, I want to seize this sad opportunity to transfer my sincere sympathies to the family, his close friends and supporters around the country," Martelly said. Duvalier's rule began to unravel in 1986. On January 31, following weeks of unrest, the White House of then US president Ronald Reagan announced the collapse of the regime - a report later denied by US and Haitian officials. Days later, on February 7, Duvalier and his family fled to France aboard a US military aircraft. In Europe, his fight was with the courts in Geneva, which blocked some of the US$6.2 million he had stashed in Swiss bank accounts. Many thought Duvalier would live out his dying days in gilded exile. However, a year after a devastating earthquake rocked Haiti in January 2010, Duvalier stunned the country by returning. His homecoming sparked speculation that he might, once again, participate in politics. Those rumours were fuelled further when his political party opened a headquarters in the southern city of Jacmel. Within days of Duvalier's return, the Rene Preval government reopened a criminal investigation into his financial crimes and his victims joined suit. Initially, the court threw out the charges of torture and murder saying they were barred by the statute of limitations. In February, however, an appeal court reversed that decision and said Duvalier could face charges of crimes against humanity. "We often say that one has cheated death," said Scott Gilmore, a staff lawyer with the Centre for Justice and Accountability, which worked on the case. "But now Baby Doc's death has cheated justice."

Death of former Haitian leader 'Baby Doc' Duvalier denies victims justice

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Since his return from exile, lawyers had been seeking to hold ex-dictator to account for abuses

Since his return from exile, lawyers had been seeking to hold ex-dictator to account for abuses