An Oklahoma-based missionary group working in Haiti’s capital was attacked by gangs on Thursday, leaving two Americans and the group’s director dead, the organization, Missions in Haiti, announced on Facebook.
Missions in Haiti runs a school for 450 children as well as two churches and a children’s home in the Bon Repos neighborhood in the northern outskirts of Port-au-Prince. The independent nonprofit was founded by an Oklahoma couple, David and Alicia Lloyd, in 2000.
The victims were the founders’ son, David Lloyd III, 23, known as Davy; his wife, Natalie Lloyd, 21; and the organization’s Haitian director, Jude Montis, 20, the group said. Ms. Lloyd is the daughter of a state representative in Missouri, Ben Baker.
“My heart is broken in a thousand pieces,” Mr. Baker posted on Facebook. “I’ve never felt this kind of pain. Most of you know my daughter and son-in-law Davy and Natalie Lloyd are full time missionaries in Haiti. They were attacked by gangs this evening and were both killed. They went to Heaven together.”
An unsigned post on the missionary group’s Facebook page, which was confirmed by a member of the organization, said the Lloyds were coming out of a section of the mission’s building when they were ambushed by three trucks full of men.
Mr. Lloyd was taken inside and beaten. The gang members then took the organization’s vehicles and other items and left. But things took a turn when a second gang showed up, and one of its members was killed.
“Now this gang went into full attack mode,” the organization said in a post that was written before the three had been killed.
The Lloyds and the director of the program were able to make phone calls and recount what was happening as it was occurring, describing how they were holed up as the gang members shot through the windows.
The organization said it would send a rescue mission and negotiate with the gangs, but it then posted a tragic update:
“Davy and Natalie and Jude were shot and killed by the gang about 9 o’clock this evening. We all are devastated.”
Haiti has been gripped by a wide-scale gang assault since February, when several gangs that normally fight each other decided to band together and fight the government. Hospitals, government buildings, police stations and prisons were attacked, and thousands of prisoners were released.
The crisis forced the resignation of Haiti’s prime minister, Ariel Henry, who was out of the country at the time and unable to return. A transitional council was named to run the flailing government while the United States helped organize a deployment of police and soldiers from several countries, led by Kenya, to fight the gangs. That mission is expected to arrive in the coming weeks.
Gang violence spread to unprecedented levels after the 2021 assassination of President Jovenel Moïse. More than 2,500 people were killed or injured in the first three months of 2024 alone, according to the United Nations.
A spokesman for the Haiti National Police said he did not have details on the killings.
