Mario Joseph

Mario Joseph in January 2010

Mario Joseph, Haiti's most prominent human rights lawyer [1], has led the Bureau des Avocats Internationaux (BAI) in Port-au-Prince since 1996. Attorney Joseph and the BAI represent political prisoners and victims of political violence, and fight to make Haiti's justice system work for poor people.

The BAI was established by the Haitian government to help victims and the justice system prosecute human rights cases, mostly from Haiti's 1991-1994 de facto military dictatorship. From 1996 to 2004, the office fought to make the justice system work for Haiti's poor, by representing human rights victims in court and helping them advocate both inside and outside of the courtroom. The BAI worked closely with judges, prosecutors, police and government officials, providing legal, technical and material assistance, as well as policy advice. The BAI has trained Haitian law school graduates, hosted U.S. law student interns and worked with U.S. law school clinics through its clinical program. Attorney Joseph has been the attorney of record for the victims, and the chief trial lawyer, and helped supervise the BAI training program.

Under Joseph's leadership, the BAI has pioneered a "victim-centered approach," that combines traditional legal representation with capacity building for victims’ organizations and political strategies to advance the interests of his clients while maximizing his cases’ impact on the broader Haitian society.

Raboteau Massacre

Attorney Joseph was the lead lawyer for the victims in the prosecution of the BAI's most successful case, the Raboteau Massacre trial. After six weeks of trial ending in November 2000, the Raboteau Massacre jury convicted 53 defendants for a 1994 attack on a pro-democracy neighborhood, including the de facto dictatorship's top military and paramilitary leaders. The Raboto case is considered Haiti's best complex criminal case ever, and one of the most important human rights prosecutions anywhere in the Americas. Three members of the military high command were deported from the U.S. to Haiti to face charges in Raboteau, including the former Assistant Commander-in-Chief, the highest ranked soldier ever deported from the U.S. to face human rights charges.

Attorney Joseph helped the Center for Justice & Accountability pursue perpetrators of the Raboteau Massacre in U.S. courts, by providing expert testimony and legal advice, and helping to coordinate with his clients. These efforts led to a historic damage recovery of $430,000 for the victims in May, 2008.

Under Haiti's brutal and unconstitutional Interim Government (2004–2006), Attorney Joseph represented political prisoners, including top former government officials, journalists and grassroots organizers. His courageous advocacy generated frequent threats- his family was forced to leave the country, and Amnesty International issued an urgent action on his behalf in October 2004. For most of these prisoners, especially those who could not afford legal fees, Attorney Joseph was the only lawyer who would take their cases.

Representative Experience

Joseph's political prisoner work has gone beyond freeing individuals from injustice, to place systematic pressure on the dictatorship and its democratic successor to respect the rule of law. His work became a focal point for international pressure on the Interim Government, and he is regularly consulted by members of the U.S. Congress, human rights organizations, journalists and grassroots activists throughout the world. Perhaps most important, by standing up for the wrongfully imprisoned during the dictatorship, Joseph gave confidence to other political dissidents, who knew that Attorney Joseph would help them if their own political activities led to arrest.

One of Joseph's most prominent cases under the Interim Government was that of Catholic Priest and human rights activist Fr. Gerard Jean-Juste, who was arrested while feeding hundreds of children their only meal of the day. "Fr. Gerry" had been imprisoned and forced into exile several times since he opposed the Duvalier dictatorship in the 1980s. The University of San Francisco conferred an honorary degree on him on September 11, 2006, in recognition of his social justice work. Fr. Jean-Juste was arrested three times in 2004 and 2005, and brought in for questioning three more times. He spent a total of seven months in prison. Joseph represented Fr. Jean-Juste at the police station, at hearings and before trial and appellate courts. He managed to obtain pre-trial release for Fr. Jean Juste twice, in October 2004 and January 2006. The second release probably saved Fr. Jean-Juste's life, as he was suffering from treatable but untreated leukemia. The charges were finally dismissed following Joseph's successful appeal of them, in June 2008. Fr. Jean-Juste is now free to return to his parish work, and to his feeding program, which now feeds over 7,000 meals a week.

Joseph's work on Fr. Jean-Juste's behalf extended beyond the courtroom, and even the borders of Haiti. He collaborated closely with Bill Quigley, Fr. Jean-Juste's U.S.-based lawyer, and a professor at Loyola New Orleans University Law School, Fr. Gerry's doctor, Dr. Paul Farmer, and with U.S. Rep. Maxine Waters, who pressured the U.S. government to intervene on Fr. Gerry's behalf.

In January 2007, Joseph testified as an expert on Haitian law before the Inter-American Court of Human Rights in Costa Rica, in the case of Yvon Neptune v. Haiti, the only Haitian case ever decided by the Court. His testimony helped convince the Court to find that Haiti had violated 11 provisions of the American Convention on Human Rights during its persecution of Neptune. He also helped convince the Court to transcend Neptune's case, and order the Haitian government to adopt a plan to improve its inhuman prison conditions within two years.

Attorney Joseph also provided expert testimony to the New York State court handling the criminal prosecution of Haitian death squad leader Emmanuel Constant, whom Joseph had helped convict in the Raboteau massacre case. Constant's New York charges were for bank fraud, but Attorney Joseph helped convince the court that Constant's crimes in Haiti justified a rejection of a plea deal giving him a light sentence.

Before BAI

Before joining the BAI, Joseph worked on human rights cases for the Catholic Church's Justice and Peace Commission. Also an educator, Joseph has held a variety of teaching and administrative posts. He is a graduate of the École Normale Supérieure, Haiti's leading teaching college, and the Gonaïves Law School. Since 2005, he has been a member of the governing Bureau of the International Association of Democratic Lawyers.

Awards and recognition

Joseph received the 2009 the Katharine and George Alexander Law Prize from Santa Clara University Law School, the 2009 Judith Lee Stronach Human Rights Award from the Center for Justice & Accountability and the 2005 Human Rights Award from the Haiti Solidarity Network of the Northeast.

External links

• IJDH Home Page