Haiti: 'Fantom 509' Raids Police Station To Free Its Mates

Mutinous police officers belonging to the "Fantom 509" group on Wednesday stormed a Port-au-Prince police station to free four fellow detainees.

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"The police released their comrades who were at the Delmas 33 police station," confirmed the Police Union Coordinator Jean Edler Lundi, as reported by Tvanouvelles.

The citizens who accompanied the policemen also violently entered the police station where they broke doors and windows.

Previously, Fantom 509 took to the streets to demand the resignation of the Haitian National Police (SPNH) Director Leon Charles whom they consider responsible for the failure of an anti-gang operation in which four officers died in the Village de Dieu slum five days ago.

The meme reads, "Video posted by the Ghosts, a dissident group of police officers who occupied the Delmas 33 police station to free their colleagues. The situation in Moise Jovenel's Haiti becomes even more unstable."

On Tuesday night, the HNP authorities announced they had recovered an armored vehicle that had been abandoned in that neighborhood but they were unable to recover the bodies of the policemen.

"Instead of going to look for the bodies to give them a burial, they went to look for their armored vehicle... That generated frustration in the police and that's why they protested," the union leader said.

On Wednesday, Haitians set tires on fire and barricaded several streets of Port-au-Prince. On the road leading to the airport, protesters vandalized a business where they set fire to a car and stole 4 vehicles.

Since July 2018, Haiti has been facing an acute political and economic crisis, which has led to ongoing demonstrations demanding the resignation of President Jovenel Moise.