Suit accuses former Haitian strongman of campaign of violence By TOM HAYS

Associated Press Writer

January 14, 2005, 5:32 PM EST

NEW YORK — An elusive former paramilitary leader from Haiti has been sued by three women who allege they were gang-raped and beaten by members of his right-wing group.

Emmanuel “Toto” Constant, 48, was served with papers on Friday as he left an appointment with the Immigration and Naturalization Service in lower Manhattan, said Moira Feeney, an attorney with the San Francisco-based Center for Justice and Accountability.

The lawsuit was filed by the anonymous plaintiffs in federal court in Manhattan in September. It had been kept under seal so that Constant _ who has been living underground in Queens _ would not be tipped off and try to dodge service of the papers, Feeney said. It was unclear whether he has an attorney, she added.

The suit, which seeks unspecified damages, alleges that Constant condoned a “systematic campaign of violence against women” by his paramilitary group, the Front for the Advancement and Progress of Haiti, or FRAPH.

The plaintiffs are Haitian women now living in the United States. Two claim they were repeatedly raped in front of family members in 1994. The third was beaten and left for dead.

The women “want to send a message that anyone who commits atrocities will no longer be able to visit or live in the U.S. with impunity,” one of the plaintiffs said in a statement.

The son of a military officer, Constant emerged as the leader FRAPH after president Jean-Bertrand Aristide was toppled in 1991. Human rights groups allege that between 1991 and 1994, FRAPH terrorized Aristide supporters, who were killed by the thousands.

After U.S. forces helped restore Aristide to power, Constant slipped into the United States through Puerto Rico on a tourist visa in 1994.

Then-U.S. Secretary of State, Warren Christopher, warned that Constant’s presence in the United States would damage U.S.-Haiti relations and recommended he be deported. Five months later, INS agents captured him in Queens.

Constant appealed his deportation on the grounds he would be killed if sent back to Haiti. He was released in 1996 on the condition that he not travel outside New York City and that he report regularly to the INS.

In 2000, a Haitian court sentenced Constant to life in prison following his conviction in absentia for the 1994 massacre of slum-dwellers loyal to Aristide.