Mourners bury journalist killed in one of Haiti’s worst attacks on reporters

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PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — Anger mixed with tears at the burial Thursday of one of the two journalists killed in an attack last month by armed gan gs while covering the government’s abortive attempt to reopen Haiti’s largest public hospital.

Jimmy Jean wore an all-white suit as he lay in an open coffin that friends and family leaned over to pay their respects, some crying over his body. The 44-year-old father of six children had covered daily news for the online news outlet Moun Afe Bon.

“You left us real young,” Jean’s stepmother kept repeating as she left the church, sobbing quietly.

On Christmas Eve, Jean was gunned down when gangs opened fire on police, government officials and journalists gathered for the anticipated reopening of the General Hospital in downtown Port-au-Prince. Also killed were fellow journalist Marckendy Natoux, who worked for Voice of America in Haiti, and a Haitian police officer. At least seven other reporters were wounded in Haiti’s worst attack on journalists in recent years.

The attack prompted officials to remove the health minister and indefinitely suspend the reopening of the hospital. Police have continued to try to repel attacks from armed gangs in the downtown area around the facility.

Journalists are demanding compensation from the government beyond the money families have received to bury the two reporters killed.

Robest Dimanche, spokesman for the Online Media Collective, a group that defends the rights of online journalists in Haiti, said the government had invited journalists to the hospital’s scheduled reopening but failed to create a safe space.

“We want the state to take responsibility,” Dimanche said. “We continue to work for the victims so they can obtain justice.”

Shortly after the attack, Johnson “Izo” André, considered Haiti’s most powerful gang leader and part of the Viv Ansanm group of gangs, which has taken control of 85% of the Port-au-Prince capital, posted a video on social media claiming responsibility for the attack. He said he had not authorized the reopening of the hospital, which gangs had previously pillaged.

More than two dozen reporters covered Jean’s funeral on Thursday in one of the world’s most dangerous places to be a journalist. Also attending Jean’s funeral were his girlfriend, Marie Mika Honoré, and his youngest son, 2-year-old Youwenski Jean, also dressed in all white.

“He was very nice, intelligent,” Honoré recalled of Jimmy Jean. “He mostly concentrated on his work.”

She said hours after he left on a motorcycle to cover the hospital reopening, the driver came back to tell her that he had been killed.

“I miss Jimmy a lot,” she said. “We never had any arguments. He took good care of his kids and me.”

The journalists were among the more than 5,600 people reported killed across Haiti last year, according to the U.N.

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Associated Press reporter Dánica Coto in San Juan, Puerto Rico contributed.