Several churchgoers are dead in Haiti after deciding to march against a dangerous gang

Several worshipers in Haiti were shot and killed Saturday when their decision to fight back against an armed gang took a deadly turn.

The individuals were among hundreds of church faithful who marched on a gang controlling the expansive post-earthquake settlement of Canaan located at the edge of Port-au-Prince. Dressed in yellow T-shirts and led by their pastor, Marcorel “Marco” Zidor, they set out against the gang and their leader “Jeff” with nothing more than machetes and sticks in their hands.

Later, images shared on social media showed the group being shot at and their bloodied bodies on the ground. Another video circulated of three captured marchers on their knees being interviewed supposedly by one of the gang members about their march.

A spokesperson for the Haiti National Police did not immediately respond to questions from the Miami Herald about the incident and reports that police had accompanied the march part of the way.

Pierre Esperance of the National Human Rights Defense Network, Marie Yolène Gilles of the Eyes Wide Open Foundation and Gédéon Jean of the Center for Analysis and Research in Human Rights, all confirmed that marchers were killed and others were injured. While Esperance and Gilles, who had been following the march through live footage on Facebook, said they did not yet have a tally on casualties, Jean said at least seven people died during the mayhem when heavily armed gang members opened fire on the group.

“There are several who are injured and others who are missing,” he said. The fate of “Pastor Marco,” Jean said, remained unknown.

He and his fellow human rights defenders criticized the comportment of the Haitian national police, which they said allowed the churchgoers to carry out a demonstration against a gang notorious for carrying out massacres and just last week warned of its intentions to shut down the last remaining open road connecting the capital to the northern regions of the country.

“You grab machetes to go attack an armed gang? The police should have blocked them,” said Jean, who also took issue with the pastor’s “irresponsible” act.

Still, he noted that the ongoing escalation in gang violence, which has turned Port-au-Prince into a war zone in recent weeks, has led to widespread desperation among Haitians.

Since April, Haitians have increasingly been taking justice into their own hands, launching a “self-defense” movement known as “Bwa Kale” where they’ve carried out lynchings against suspected gang members. The United Nations has said that at least 350 people, including 310 alleged gang members and a police officer, have been killed as part of the rise in vigilante justice across the country.

“The people are in a desperate situation and they are seeing if they can defend themselves,” Jean said. “They know the police cannot help them and all the international community is doing is holding meetings to discuss the problem but they are not giving the police the means to help.”