Haiti Judge Slaps Baptist With New Charge

(CBS/ AP)  The last of 10 American missionaries detained in Haiti on suspicion of kidnapping is facing a new charge.

Judge Bernard Saint-Vil says Laura Silsby has been charged for a newly discovered, alleged attempt to bus child earthquake survivors to the Dominican Republic on Jan. 26.

She already could face trial on kidnapping and criminal-association charges from her group's attempt to take 33 children across the border without permission three days later.

Haiti: The Road to Recovery

Saint-Vil has added the new charge of "organization of irregular trips," from a 1980 law restricting travel out of Haiti that was signed by then-dictator Jean-Claude Duvalier.

The judge said Friday he has until early May to decide whether to release Silsby or order a trial.

More Coverage of the Baptists

Haiti Frees 9th U.S. Baptist, Not Leader
Haiti Kids With Baptists Weren't Orphans
Americans Freed by Haiti Welcomed Home
Haiti Kidnap Case Nears Resolution
Baptists' Lawyer: They Had Paperwork

One of Silsby's fellow missionaries .

Charisa Coulter was taken from her jail cell to the airport by U.S. Embassy staff more than a month after she and nine other Americans were arrested.

Coulter told CBS News at the airport in Haiti, just before boarding her flight home, that she had "learned a lot" through her experience, and she wouldn't soon forget the lessons.

She said it "feels wonderful" to be released and that she was looking forward to Silsby "getting out soon."

Defense attorney Louis Ricardo Chachoute said Coulter was released because there was no evidence to support the charges of kidnapping and criminal association. Before Friday's announcement of the new charge against Silsby, he predicted she would be released soon.

"There are no prosecution witnesses to substantiate anything," Chachoute said.

[jankebenzone]

formrusmcsgt,
TAKE NOTE, " There are NO prosecution witnesses to substantiate ANYTHING"
With the release of missionary #9 you are now 90% WRONG, and will soon be !00% WRONG in your allegations that these christians were child kidnappers.

[msay3]

Why do these religious self-professed do-gooders go through such lengths to help people in other countries while reaping the benefits from this country? The poor and deprived children and their families trying to survive in the US need help every bit as much!!

This country is in turmoil, just as is Haiti...it just isn't as obvious...Jobs have been lost, families have lost everything, people are going hungry and are being deprived of medical care; and what is being done about it? Not much!! Our government is at war within it's own borders to gain political power...The political parties engage each other in a game of "chicken" to see who will capitulate first!! There is more corruption in the American Government than in the Haitian government...The American Government just happens to be more sophisticated and can hide the corruption better.....

[farmertommy]

RELIGION IS THE PROBLEM, IT IS WHATS WRONG WITH OUR COUNTRY,

WHO DO YOU THINKS RUNS THINGS LIKE BUSH/CHENEY, AND THE

LYING, CHEATING, ANTI AMERICAN FOX TELEVISION CHANNELS.

[banned60times]

Hi, I am farmertommy, I have something important to say, only no one listens. SO IF I SPEAK IN CAPS LIKE THIS, PEOPLE WILL HEAR ME! AND UNDERSTAND ME MORE! AND DAMMIT THEY WILL LIKE ME AFTER I CONVINCE WITH THESE CAPS, THEY WERE WRONG ALL ALONG!

Now, go up to one of those religion of peace guys and tell them what you think of them, coward. After all, separation of church and state? Or does that not apply to the religion of peace?

[peacefulperson]

See, I think politics is the problem with this country. As long as congress feels what's good for their party is good for us without even consulting us on what we want, nothing is ever going to go good again.

[rondivoo]

Silsby is simple-minded... investigate her background and we'll know why... look into the group she was with and also note where they live. These factors all represent where she and the others were coming from mentally and socially. Ignorance is never an excuse for breaking laws.

[farmertommy]

exactly correct, did you know that her father, in his living room,

has a painting pf Jefferson and Washington on their knees praying to

'his' god. These people are right wing whack jobs, just like those

texas conservative that just decide that Thomas Jefferson did not

belong in their textbooks because he was in reality a Deist.

[longtime2123]

What if the earthquake had been in south Texas and Mexican do-gooders were coming into the US and transporting the poor children out of our country for a "better life" in a Mennonite orphanage in Jurarz. There's a large community of them there to raise our poor little kids. Would you complain curiously1?

[KeithDrippingSprings]

I hope they scare her bad enough that she stops trying to steal children. I do believe that most of the group were just overzealous christian do-gooders but I don't think you can excuse Laura's actions quite as easily.

[peacefulperson]

Unfortunately overzealous do-gooders come in every variety, not just Christian. And just because a group is fronted by a church doesn't make it Christian. The things that this group did might have been motivated by the desire to help (or not), but there is nothing in Christ's teachings that would support taking poor children away from their families and communities and trying to make Americans out of them. If anything, these people were overzealous American do-gooders; the fact that they were fronted by a church is incidental.

[smoknmirrors]

Are there any other laws established by a long-dead, deposed dictator when she was 12 years old they can use to break her? Alone and isolated from her support system, dying a death of a thousand cuts in a putrid cell, denied adequate legal representation in the midst of a rotting, decaying country ravaged by natural disasters and ruled by bribery and extortion is its own version of "waterboarding." And Jesus said, "suffer the children to come unto me." But not without ze proper papers, of course.

[peacefulperson]

It was totally her decision to react without checking out the laws of the land in which she was a visitor. Haiti has the right to prosecute those who break its laws, no matter when they were enacted. She volunteered to go into this "rotting, decaying country ravaged by natural disasters and ruled by bribery and extortion" (your words, not mine). What did you think she was going to do there, live in a country club and be treated as a special class of person because she is an American and a Christian?

[babooph]

All these "tough on crime" Baptists are welcoming home the criminals-what would the word be for that behavior?

[mrleme]

"There are no prosecution witnesses to substantiate anything," Chachoute said. This statement says it all, the Baptist missionaries are all innocent.

[peacefulperson]

Defense attorneys always say that. It's their job.

[mrleme]

peacefulperson, this country, Haiti, is not the United States and runs it's government very differently. We, in the U.S., only receive filtered information. Missionaries and many other organizations have fed and given medical help free to the people of Haiti for many, many years. What has their government done to detach itself from the designation of "the poorest country in the Americas?" One has to wonder of government corruption when the very people who have helped them for decades is accused of an absurd crime. Haiti does itself a disservice by prosecuting the very people who daily put their lives on the line to help them.

[formrusmcsgt]

Even though she was stopped TWICE for trafficking children, do they still count towards the jewels in her crown?

[peacefulperson]

Some people think what they are doing has a higher purpose than the law, but Christians are called to live by the laws of the land, whatever land that is, and to obey the government. Trafficking children is not something God would reward.