U.S. missionaries charged with children's abduction

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — Ten Americans who tried to take 33 Haitian children out of Haiti last week without the government's consent were charged Thursday with child abduction and criminal conspiracy, as Haitian officials sought to reassert judicial control after the Jan. 12 earthquake.

The Americans, most of them members of a Baptist congregation from Idaho, had said they intended to rescue Haitian children left parentless in the quake and take them to what they described as an orphanage across the border in the Dominican Republic. But they acknowledged failing to seek approval to move the children, and several of the children have at least one living parent.

The Americans, if convicted, face prison terms of up to 15 years.

The charges will be considered by an investigative judge, who under Haitian law has up to three months to decide whether to pursue the matter.

The leader of the group, Laura Silsby, 40, chief executive of PersonalShopper.com who also describes herself as a missionary, has come under scrutiny at home in Idaho, where she is the subject of lawsuits over unpaid wages and unpaid bills, and the state has placed liens on her company bank account.

The lawyer for the group, Edwin Coq, said after the hearing Thursday that nine of his 10 clients were "completely innocent," but that, in an apparent reference to Silsby, "if the judiciary were to keep one, it could be the leader of the group."

The Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince, lost courthouses, judges, lawyers and its main prison in the earthquake, straining the judiciary along with everything else. Prosecutors said this was the first criminal case to receive a hearing in Port-au-Prince since the 7.0-earthquake.

The Americans were transported in two Haitian police vehicles from the police station where they have been held since the weekend to Port-au-Prince's main criminal courthouse.

Before court, Silsby, who had helped organize the group's mission, said, "We're just trusting God for a positive outcome."

During the hearing, Jean Ferge Joseph, a deputy prosecutor, told the Americans their case would be sent to a judge for further review. "That judge can free you, but he can also continue to hold you for further proceedings," the deputy prosecutor said, according to Reuters.

Reuters, which had a reporter in the session, reported that all 10 acknowledged that they had apparently violated the law when they tried to take the children from Haiti, although they said they were unaware of that until after they were detained.

"We did not have any intention to violate the law, but now we understand it's a crime," said Paul Robert Thompson, a pastor.

Silsby asked the prosecutor to release the group, whose members range in age from 18 to 55, and to allow it to continue its work in Haiti. "We simply wanted to help the children," she said.

U.S. Ambassador Kenneth Merten said Thursday, "The U.S. justice system cannot interfere in what's going on with these Americans right now. The Haitian justice system will do what it has to do."

The Americans were arrested Friday as they tried to take the 33 children by bus to the Dominican Republic, where they said they were in the process of leasing or building an orphanage.

At least two-thirds of the children, who range in age from 2 to 12, have parents who gave them away because they said the Americans promised the children a better life. Most of the children came from the quake-ravaged village of Callebas, which overlooks Port-au-Prince.

A Web site for the group, the New Life Children's Refuge, said the children would stay in a "loving Christian homelike environment" and be eligible for adoption through U.S. agencies.

Silsby had made her intentions known to child-protection officials, human-rights experts and Dominican authorities in Haiti, all of whom warned her she could be charged with trafficking if she tried to take children out of the country without proper documentation.

Material from The Associated Press and McClatchy Newspapers is included in this report.