Haiti police say former rebel leader Wilfort Ferdinand killed after checkpoint shooting

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — A spokesman for Haiti’s National Police said Thursday that officers killed former rebel leader Wilfort Ferdinand after they accused him of firing on a police checkpoint in the coastal town of Gonaïves earlier this week.

Ferdinand, a suspected gang leader who played a key role in the 2004 uprising that ousted former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, was identified by authorities as a principal figure in violence in the Artibonite region. "Police had no intention of killing anyone," police spokesman Michel-Ange Louis Jeune told The Associated Press of Tuesday’s shooting. He said that Ferdinand had approached the checkpoint in a car with tinted windows only to back up and then open fire on officers, who returned fire and killed him and an unidentified person traveling with him. Jeune said it was a routine checkpoint aimed at cracking down on the Kokorat San Ras gang, which operates in the Artibonite region and is known for its extreme violence.

Protests erupted in Gonaïves in the hours after the shooting, with demonstrators briefly shutting businesses and blocking streets. Local media reported heavy gunfire in parts of the city as crowds gathered to express anger over the killing. Ferdinand, known as Kòmandan Ti Wil, led the Artibonite Resistance Front and was an ally of Guy Philippe, another former rebel leader. His death comes amid Haiti’s broader struggle with armed groups that have intensified street violence and strained a security apparatus that has struggled to contain criminal networks in multiple regions.