Jean Dominique
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Jean Léopold Dominique (31 July 1930 – 3 April 2000) was a Haitian journalist and activist for
human rights Human rights are universally recognized Morality, moral principles or Social norm, norms that establish standards of human behavior and are often protected by both Municipal law, national and international laws. These rights are considered ...
and democracy in
Haiti Haiti, officially the Republic of Haiti, is a country on the island of Hispaniola in the Caribbean Sea, east of Cuba and Jamaica, and south of the Bahamas. It occupies the western three-eighths of the island, which it shares with the Dominican ...
. His station, Radio Haiti-Inter, was the first to broadcast news, investigative reporting, and political analysis in
Haitian Creole Haitian Creole (; , ; , ), or simply Creole (), is a French-based creole languages, French-based creole language spoken by 10 to 12million people worldwide, and is one of the two official languages of Haiti (the other being French), where it ...
, the language spoken by most Haitian people. On 3 April 2000 he was assassinated as he arrived for work at Radio Haiti-Inter. An extensive though turbulent investigation failed to officially identify and bring to justice the primary perpetrators, who remain at large.


Personal life and early career

Jean Dominique was born in
Port-au-Prince Port-au-Prince ( ; ; , ) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities in Haiti, most populous city of Haiti. The city's population was estimated at 1,200,000 in 2022 with the metropolitan area estimated at a population of 2,618,894. The me ...
to Léopold Dominique, a trader originally from Rivière Froide, and Marcelle (Pereira) Dominique. As a child, Dominique frequently accompanied his father on trips throughout the Haitian countryside, which led him to know and understand the lives and struggles of peasant farmers. Dominique's elder brother Philippe was an officer in the
Haitian army Originating from the Army of Saint-Domingue (1791–1803), then the Indigenous Army (1803–1915), the Haitian Army (''Armée d'Haiti'') is the Land warfare, land component of the Armed Forces of Haiti. It is the largest branch of the armed forces ...
who, along with fellow officers Alix Pasquet and Henry Perpignan, was killed in an
attempt An attempt to commit a crime occurs if a criminal has an intent to commit a crime and takes a substantial step toward completing the crime, but for reasons not intended by the criminal, the final resulting crime does not occur.''Criminal Law - ...
to occupy the Casernes Dessalines and overthrow
François Duvalier François Duvalier (; 14 April 190721 April 1971), also known as Papa Doc, was a Haiti, Haitian politician and Haitian Vodou, Vodouisant who served as the president of Haiti from 1957 until his death in 1971. He was elected president in the 195 ...
in July 1958. His eldest sister, Madeleine Dominique Paillère, was a well-known author and intellectual. After completing his primary and secondary schooling at Institution Saint-Louis de Gonzague, Dominique began studying at the Faculté d’Agronomie in Port-au-Prince in 1948, where he received his degree in 1951. Dominique then received a scholarship to studied genetically modified cacao and coffee plants at the in
Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...
. He returned to Haiti in 1955 leaving his girlfriend while she is pregnant and began to work as an agronomist in in the Nord department with the Institut Haïtien de Crédit Agricole et Industriel as well as the Société Haitiano-Américaine de Développement Agricole (SHADA), primarily on
sisal Sisal (, ; ''Agave sisalana'') is a species of flowering plant native to southern Mexico, but widely cultivated and naturalized in many other countries. It yields a stiff fibre used in making rope and various other products. The sisal fiber is ...
and
rubber Rubber, also called India rubber, latex, Amazonian rubber, ''caucho'', or ''caoutchouc'', as initially produced, consists of polymers of the organic compound isoprene, with minor impurities of other organic compounds. Types of polyisoprene ...
production. He worked alongside agronomist Edner Vil, who was subsequently arrested and killed by the Duvalier regime for promoting the rights of peasant farmers. Dominique, who had been working with the ti peyizan to defend their land rights against the chefs de section (local Duvalierist authorities) and wealthy landowners, was arrested a few weeks after his brother's attempt to overthrow the regime, and he spent six months in prison in
Gonaïves Gonaïves (; also Les Gonaïves; , ) is a commune in northern Haiti, and the capital of the Artibonite department of Haiti. The population was 356,324 at the 2015 census. History The city of Gonaïves was founded around 1422 by a group of T ...
. After his release, he was no longer permitted to work as an agronomist, and instead became a journalist. In the early 1960s, after his release from prison, Dominique went to work as a program host and cultural commentator at Haiti's first independent radio station, Radio Haïti, interviewing writers and scholars. In 1972, he purchased the lease to the station from Ricardo Widmaïer and renamed it Radio Haiti-Inter. It was the first radio station in Haiti to broadcast political analysis, interviews, and investigative reporting in Haitian Creole, the language spoken by the entire population of Haiti, in addition to French, which was the language of the ruling elite. During the 1960s, Dominique also founded Haiti's first film club at the Institut Français in Port-au-Prince, which he understood to be a way of subverting and resisting the political repression of the Duvalier dictatorship. In 1965, the film club was banned following a screening of Alain Resnais's
Night and Fog ''Nacht und Nebel'' (German: ), meaning Night and Fog, also known as the Night and Fog Decree, was a directive issued by Adolf Hitler on 7 December 1941 targeting political activists and resistance "helpers" in the territories occupied by Naz ...
, an anti-fascist film about the Nazi concentration camps. In 1961, Dominique co-directed and narrated Haiti's first documentary film, Mais, je suis belle (But, I Am Beautiful), an ironic film about Caribbean beauty pageants. Dominique remained a staunch supporter of Haitian cinema, and collaborated with Haitian filmmakers such as Rassoul Labuchin. Dominique was married to fellow journalist
Michèle Montas Michèle Montas (born 1946) is a journalist from Haiti and the former Spokesperson under UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon (January 1, 2007 – January 1, 2010). Prior to her appointment, Montas headed the French unit of UN Radio. From 2003 to 20 ...
, who became the co-director of Radio Haiti after Dominique's assassination. He had three daughters by previous marriages: the writer Jan J. (J.J.) Dominique, Nadine Dominique, and Dolores Dominique Neptune. He also had a son, the novelist Denis Boucolon from a relationship with an
Afro-Caribbean Afro-Caribbean or African Caribbean people are Caribbean people who trace their full or partial ancestry to Sub-Saharan Africa. The majority of the modern Afro-Caribbean people descend from the Indigenous peoples of Africa, Africans (primarily fr ...
student from
Guadeloupe Guadeloupe is an Overseas departments and regions of France, overseas department and region of France in the Caribbean. It consists of six inhabited islands—Basse-Terre Island, Basse-Terre, Grande-Terre, Guadeloupe, Grande-Terre, Marie-Galant ...
, Maryse Boucolon.


Career at Radio Haïti-Inter


1971–1980

Throughout the 1970s, Jean Dominique used Radio Haiti to highlights aspects of Haitian culture rooted in its Creole-speaking majority and repressed for almost two centuries by its French-speaking elite. Dominique and Radio Haiti also reported increasingly on events that would challenge the regime of
Jean-Claude Duvalier Jean-Claude Duvalier (; 3 July 19514 October 2014), nicknamed "Baby Doc" (, ), was a Haitian dictator who held the presidency of Haiti from 1971 until he was overthrown by a popular uprising in February 1986. He succeeded his father François ...
, often strategically and indirectly to circumvent the regime's
censorship Censorship is the suppression of speech, public communication, or other information. This may be done on the basis that such material is considered objectionable, harmful, sensitive, or "inconvenient". Censorship can be conducted by governmen ...
laws. For example, Radio Haiti reported in 1972 for weeks, on the fall of the dictator of Nicaragua, Anastasio "Tachito" Somoza Debayle, as a proxy for talking about Duvalier. In 1973 and 1976, Dominique reported from the annual Vodou pilgrimage at Saut-d’Eau on worshippers’ lamentations and entreaties to the spirits: an implicit way of talking about peasant resistance : “We were under Jean-Claude Duvalier, we were under igh-ranking Macoutes likeLuc Désir, Jean Valmé, Luckner Cambronne, and company We were under the tigers!” Dominique later explained. “The people opened their arms in front of the pilgrimage site, they looked toward the church, and they described their misery. They described their oppression, how the life was squeezed out of them 'peze-souse'' They described how everything was being destroyed 'kraze-brize'' They spelled it all out. They described it in a litany, for hours. For days.” As the Haitian government relied on assistance from the United States, Duvalier had little choice but to comply with certain human rights rules and principles while
Jimmy Carter James Earl Carter Jr. (October 1, 1924December 29, 2024) was an American politician and humanitarian who served as the 39th president of the United States from 1977 to 1981. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party ...
was president. However, as Carter's term came to an end, Duvalier's opposition to the free press became more pronounced. In October 1980, he announced that ''le bal est fini'' (the party is over) for the independent press. Dominique, reading the writing on the wall, responded with one of his most famous editorials, entitled “Bon appétit, messieurs,” addressed to the journalists of the state press. “For you, the banquet shall resume. And you will not hear any discordant sounds, any noise that might disturb your appetites. You will not be distracted from your plentiful feast by the cries of the poor, the screams of the boat people devoured by sharks, the gunshots killing our cane-cutter brothers in Santo Domingo or in Nassau or La Romana... No, you will not hear those discordant, disagreeable noises that might trouble your meal, that might prevent you from celebrating -- it will be only silence... So you may celebrate at ease, gentlemen! At ease! And in that profound silence: Bon appétit, messieurs!” On 28 November 1980, shortly after
Ronald Reagan Ronald Wilson Reagan (February 6, 1911 – June 5, 2004) was an American politician and actor who served as the 40th president of the United States from 1981 to 1989. He was a member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party a ...
won the
US presidential election The election of the president and vice president of the United States is an indirect election in which citizens of the United States who are registered to vote in one of the fifty U.S. states or in Washington, D.C., cast ballots not directl ...
, Duvalier cracked down on the independent press, human rights activists, and union leaders in Haiti. Duvalier's militia, the Tontons Macoutes, ransacked and destroyed Radio Haiti's studios. Nearly all of Radio Haiti's journalists were arrested; some, including station manager Richard Brisson, were tortured. Most were released within days and then exiled. An order was issued for Jean Dominique to be killed on sight. He spent two months in asylum at the Venezuelan embassy, before he joined Montas in New York, where they married in 1983.


1986–1991

On 5 March 1986, less than a month after Duvalier's ouster, Dominique and Montas returned to Haiti, and were greeted at the airport by nearly 60,000 people. That October, Radio Haiti reopened with funds raised by ordinary Haitian people. Through the late 1980s, as Haiti endured successive military coups d’état, Dominique continued to advocate for democratic participation, human rights, peasant rights, and for the removal of Duvalierist and Macoute elements from the government and the army. He devoted a great deal of airtime and analysis, for example, to the July 1987 massacre of peasant farmers by landowners and Macoutes in Jean Rabel. Haiti's first democratic elections were scheduled for 29 November 1987, but were violently suppressed by the army, which slaughtered voters at Ruelle Vaillant and destroyed electoral bureaus throughout the country. Radio Haiti came under armed attack that day, as ordered by Williams Régala; Dominique and the other journalists stood on the roof throwing rocks and bottles as the army fired machine guns and grenades. Dominique was an early supporter of the Lavalas movement and
Jean-Bertrand Aristide Jean-Bertrand Aristide (; born 15 July 1953) is a Haitian former Salesian priest and politician who became Haiti's first democratically elected president in 1991 before being deposed in a coup d'état. As a priest, he taught liberation theo ...
, the parish priest and outspoken proponent of liberation theology. Radio Haiti covered the 11 September 1988 massacre in which attachés under the orders of Port-au-Prince mayor Franck Romain massacred parishioners at Aristide's St. Jean Bosco church, and interviewed Aristide several times as a priest and as a presidential candidate, and, finally, after his victory in Haiti's first democratic elections in December 1990. When the military under
Raoul Cédras Joseph Raoul Cédras (born July 9, 1949) is a Haitian former military officer who was the '' de facto'' ruler of Haiti from 1991 to 1994. Cedras was the last military ruler of Haiti. Background A mulatto, Cédras was educated in the United St ...
overthrew the government of Jean-Bertrand Aristide in September 1991, Radio Haiti once more had to close and Dominique and Montas again went into exile in New York. During these years, Dominique published op eds and appeared on the Charlie Rose show to encourage a return to constitutional order in Haiti. He also collaborated with the American filmmaker
Jonathan Demme Robert Jonathan Demme ( ; February 22, 1944 – April 26, 2017) was an American filmmaker, whose career directing, producing, and screenwriting spanned more than 30 years and 70 feature films, documentaries, and television productions. He was an ...
on the interviews that would eventually become the documentary '' The Agronomist'', and on an unfinished project on the History of Haitian Cinema. In June 1993, Dominique was part of Aristide's entourage at the
Governors Island Governors Island is a island in New York Harbor, within the Boroughs of New York City, New York City borough of Manhattan. It is located approximately south of Manhattan Island, and is separated from Brooklyn to the east by the Buttermilk ...
meeting between the democratically elected government in exile and the leaders of the military junta. Dominique returned to Haiti in 1994, after Aristide's return to power, and reopened Radio Haiti the following year.


1995–2000

In the final years of his life, Dominique concentrated on issues of state corruption and criminal negligence by the private sector. He investigated Pharval Laboratories, a pharmaceutical company, for selling cough syrup contaminated with
diethylene glycol Diethylene glycol (DEG) is an organic compound with the formula (HOCH2CH2)2O. It is a colorless, practically odorless, and hygroscopic liquid with a sweetish taste. It is a four carbon Dimer (chemistry), dimer of ethylene glycol. It is miscible in ...
that was responsible for the poisoning of two hundred children, of whom sixty died. He also denounced the importation of medical-grade ethanol that was being sold as counterfeit ''
clairin Clairin (, , ) is a distilled alcoholic spirit made from sugarcane produced in Haiti, that undergoes the same distillation process as rhum, although not as refined. There are between 500 and 600 micro-distilleries in Haiti, compared to fewer th ...
'' (high-proof undistilled sugar cane spirits), sickening and killing people who consumed it while undercutting the livelihood of Haiti's sugar planters and distillers. As a journalist who emphasized his own political objectivity and that of his staff, Dominique took pains to remain nonpartisan in his professional activities. He did, however, strongly support grassroots peasants’ rights groups, especially KOZEPEP whose leader, Charles Suffrard, was a close friend and collaborator of Dominique. Though as a private citizen Dominique was an early supporter of the Lavalas movement, he later investigated Aristide and other members of
Fanmi Lavalas Fanmi Lavalas (; ''lavalas'' is Haitian Creole for 'avalanche' or 'flood' ) is a social-democratic political party in Haiti. Its leader is former Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide. It has been a powerful force in Haitian politics since 199 ...
for corruption and misappropriation of government funds, and for betraying the promise of the ''twa wòch dife'', the three cornerstones of the Lavalas movement: participation, justice, and transparency. In a tense 16 December 1996 ''Face à l’Opinion'' interview, Dominique questioned Aristide about state corruption, particularly in his ''petits projets de la présidence''. Dominique also took on former police chief, Dany Toussaint, for attempting to take control of the country's security apparatus after the assassination of his rival for the position of Secretary of State for Public Security, Jean Lamy. As a result of this, Toussaint's supporters surrounded and attacked the radio station building. In February 2000, Toussaint's lawyers Gérard Georges and Jean-Claude Nord openly made death threats against Jean Dominique and Michèle Montas on the airwaves of Serge Beaulieu's New York-based Duvalierist radio station Radio Liberté. This led Dominique to declare in an October 1999 editorial, “I know that oussainthas the money to pay and arm his followers. Here, I have no other weapon than my journalist's pen! And my microphone and my unquenchable faith as a militant for true change!... If Dany Toussaint tries anything else against me or the station, and if I am still alive, I will close the place down after I have denounced these maneuvers one more time and I will go in exile once more with my wife and children.”


Assassination and investigation

On 3 April 2000, at the age of 69, Dominique was shot four times in the chest and neck as he arrived for work at Radio Haïti. A station employee named Jean-Claude Louissaint was also killed in the attack. President
René Préval René Garcia Préval (; 17 January 1943 – 3 March 2017) was a Haitian Politics of Haiti, politician and agronomist who twice was President of Haiti, from early 1996 to early 2001, and again from mid-2006 to mid-2011. He was also List of Prime ...
ordered three days of official mourning, and 15,000 people, among them 10,000 peasant farmers, attended the joint funeral at Stade Sylvio Cator in downtown Port-au-Prince on 8 April. On 15 April, more than 5,000 peasant farmers from the Artibonite gathered in
Pont-Sondé Pont-Sondé (, ) is a town in the communal section of Bocozelle in the Saint-Marc commune, in the Artibonite department of Haiti. Location Located within the Saint-Marc Arrondissement, Pont-Sondé is located at an important crossroads on the ...
to pay tribute, and the following day, Dominique's ashes were poured into the
Artibonite River The Artibonite River ( French: ''Fleuve Artibonite''; Spanish: '' Río Artibonito''; Haitian Creole: ''Latibonit'') is the longest river in Haiti, and the longest on the island of Hispaniola. It is also the second-longest river in the Caribbean, b ...
at Passe Caneau, so that, in the words of Charles Suffrard, Dominique could continue to nourish each grain of rice the river reached. In the years following Dominique's assassination, civil society and grassroots groups in Haiti held large public protests and sit-ins calling for justice for Dominique and Louissaint. International human rights organizations, including
Amnesty International Amnesty International (also referred to as Amnesty or AI) is an international non-governmental organization focused on human rights, with its headquarters in the United Kingdom. The organization says that it has more than ten million members a ...
and
Reporters Without Borders Reporters Without Borders (RWB; ; RSF) is an international non-profit and non-governmental organisation, non-governmental organization headquartered in Paris, which focuses on safeguarding the right to freedom of information. It describes its a ...
, launched years-long campaigns demanding justice for Jean Dominique. There have been several obstructions and irregularities in the investigation into the murders, originating in the police, parliament, and the executive branch. In 2000, supporters of chief suspect Dany Toussaint, some of them armed, threatened to set fire to the courthouse, and in 2001, Toussaint (then a sitting senator for the Fanmi Lavalas party) claimed parliamentary immunity from appearing in court, which the senate refused to revoke. The president of the Senate, Yvon Neptune, pronounced that a “little judge” could not summon a senator. The Minister of Justice at the time, Gary Lissade, had previously been Dany Toussaint's attorney. The first judge in the Jean Dominique case, Claudy Gassant, was subject to repeated threats to his safety, and in 2002, Aristide refused to renew his mandate. In March 2003, Judge Bernard Saint-Vil concluded that a small group of low-level criminals were responsible for the murder, but that there was insufficient evidence to indict Dany Toussaint—findings that Dominique's widow Michèle Montas contested in an appellate court, demanding that the intellectual authors of the crime be found and punished. In December 2004, more than 75% of documents relating to the investigation disappeared from the Cour de Cassation (Haiti's Supreme Court). In addition, several suspects and witnesses died under mysterious circumstances. Most recently, in March 2015 Aristide's former chief of security Oriel Jean was gunned down by unknown assailants, after which journalist Guy Delva released an interview in which Jean suggested that Aristide had ordered Dominique's assassination. To date, the perpetrators of the crime have never been brought to justice. On Christmas Day 2002, there was an attempt on Michèle Montas's life in which her bodyguard, Maxime Seïde, was murdered. Amid increasing threats to the safety of Radio Haïti's journalists, the station closed for good in February 2003.


Legacy

Jonathan Demme covered the life and death of Dominique in his 2003 documentary '' The Agronomist''. The Centre de Production Agricole Jean L. Dominique in
Marmelade Marmelade (; ) is a List of communes of Haiti, commune and former duchy in the Artibonite (department), Artibonite Departments of Haiti, department of Haiti. It is the chief town of the Marmelade Arrondissement, which also includes the commune ( ...
, in the north of Haiti, created in 2001 by former President René Preval in memory of Dominique, is an agricultural training center for coffee and cacao producers. A reforestation hub, it is also home to a cooperative of citrus growers, with a juice processing plant, while the bamboo trees on the grounds are used for the production of furniture. The archives of Radio Haiti-Inter are currently being processed by the Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library at
Duke University Duke University is a Private university, private research university in Durham, North Carolina, United States. Founded by Methodists and Quakers in the present-day city of Trinity, North Carolina, Trinity in 1838, the school moved to Durham in 1 ...
, with the goal of preserving, digitizing, and digitally repatriating Radio Haiti's recordings to Haiti.


See also

*
List of assassinations This is a list of successful assassinations, sorted by location. For failed assassination attempts, see List of people who survived assassination attempts. For the purposes of this article, an assassination is defined as the deliberate, premedit ...
* List of unsolved murders


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Dominique, Jean 1930 births 2000 deaths 20th-century Haitian writers Assassinated Haitian journalists Deaths by firearm in Haiti Haitian agronomists Mulatto Haitians Haitian political journalists Mass media people from Port-au-Prince People murdered in Haiti Unsolved murders in North America 2000 murders in North America 20th-century agronomists 20th-century Haitian journalists