The local director of a mission group in Haiti and a U.S. missionary couple were attacked and fatally shot by gang members after leaving a youth group activity at a church, a family member told The Associated Press.
The murders of Jude Montis, the local director of Missions in Haiti Inc., and Davy and Natalie Lloyd, a young married couple from the US, occurred Thursday in the community of Lizon in northern Port-au-Prince. They were killed as the capital crumbled under the brutal onslaught of violent gangs who control 80% of the capital, as authorities await the arrival of a police force from Kenya as part of a UN-backed deployment aimed at quelling gang violence in the troubled Caribbean. country.
Here are some things to know about the missionary work that focused on helping the children in Haiti and the gang attack that took three lives.
Missions in Haiti’s website says the goal is “to see the Gospel of Christ make a difference in the lives of Haitian youth.”
Davy Lloyd’s parents, David and Alicia Lloyd of Oklahoma, started the organization in 2000 with the goal of focusing on the children of Haiti. David and Alicia Lloyd are full-time missionaries in Haiti.
“Although the entire country lives in poverty, children suffer the worst,” they wrote on the website. “Thousands are malnourished, uneducated and headed toward a hopeless life without Christ.”
Hannah Cornett, Davy’s sister, told The Associated Press that they grew up in Haiti. Davy Lloyd went to the US to attend a Bible school and married Natalie in June 2022. After the wedding, the couple wasted little time moving to Haiti to do humanitarian work.
Cornett said Montis, a Haitian, had worked in missions in Haiti for 20 years.
The organization’s efforts include House of Compassion, which provides housing for 36 children — 18 boys and 18 girls, according to its website. “Everyone is destined to stay at House of Compassion until they finish school and are ready to live on their own.”
Good Hope Boys’ Home houses 22 boys, according to its website. The organization also built a church, a bakery and a school with more than 240 students, according to its website.
A Facebook post on the Missions in Haiti page said Davy Lloyd, 23, and Natalie Lloyd, 21, along with several children, were leaving a church when gang members ambushed them in three trucks.
Davy Lloyd later called his family to tell them that gang members had hit him in the head with the barrel of a gun, forced him upstairs, stole their belongings and left him tied up, Cornett said.
As people helped untie Davy Lloyd, another group of armed men appeared, Cornett said.
“No one understood what they were doing, I wasn’t sure what happened, but one was shot and killed and now this gang was on full attack,” the Missions in Haiti post said.
The couple and Montis fled to a house connected to the mission.
“They tried to take cover there, but the gang shot the house on fire,” Cornett said.
Ben Baker, Natalie Lloyd’s father and Republican state representative in Missouri, posted on Facebook on Friday that the bodies of Davy and Natalie Lloyd had been safely transported to the U.S. Embassy.
Cornett said Montis left behind two children, ages 2 and 6.
Montis’ family could not immediately be reached for comment on Friday. It is unclear whether he used social media and, if so, whether his profiles are public. Missions in Haiti did not immediately respond to the AP’s request for comment on Friday.
Baker wrote on Facebook that his heart had been “broken into a thousand pieces.”
“I have never felt such pain,” Baker wrote. “Most of you know that my daughter and son-in-law, Davy and Natalie Lloyd, are full-time missionaries in Haiti. They were attacked by mobs tonight and were both killed. They went to heaven together. Please pray for my family, we desperately need strength. And please pray for the Lloyd family as well. For now I have no other words.”
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Associated Press writer Summer Ballentine in Columbia, Missouri, contributed.