Jacqui Wakefield, Christopher Giles and Joshua Cheatham
BBC World Service
The assault rifles and pistols arrived in Haiti packed in two cardboard boxes, nestled between packages of food and clothing, on a cargo ship with shipping containers red with rust.
They arrived from America, which one expert calls a "supermarket" that is fueling an arms race between gangs, bringing chaos to this Caribbean island nation.
An investigation by the BBC World Service and BBC Verify followed the journey of these two boxes, demonstrating how weapons from America arrived in Haiti.
It reveals a chain of lax laws, lack of checks and suspicion of corruption that smugglers use to circumvent the United Nations embargo.
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Seizure
Haitian police announced in April 2024 that they had seized two boxes.
They contained 12 automatic rifles, 14 pistols and 999 rounds of ammunition.
The police photo clearly shows weapons from two different American manufacturers.
The shipment traveled nearly 1.200 kilometers from Fort Lauderdale, Florida, to Cap-Haitien in northern Haiti, on a cargo ship named the Rayner D.
The shipping container was loaded in a Fort Lauderdale warehouse yard, according to a UN Panel of Experts tasked with monitoring sanctions imposed on Haiti and which investigated the shipment.
Haitians in America often send much-needed food and other goods to this country.
A man named Anestin Predestin told Miami Herald that at the end of February 2024 he was renting space in a container.
He told the newspaper that a man who identified himself as "Diamortino" dropped two boxes inside, saying they contained "clothes" and that he was shocked to later learn that they actually contained weapons.
BBC attempts to contact Predestin were unsuccessful.
It is not clear where this weapon was purchased.
No weapons are manufactured in Haiti, and the previously seized weapons were purchased in Florida.
Sometimes called the "gun shine state," Florida is one of about 30 US states where, until 2024, private sellers could sell firearms, such as at gun shows or online, without requiring a background check on the buyer.
As president, Joseph Biden tightened these rules at the national level.
A UN panel says two Haitian brothers living in America used "straw buyers," individuals who shopped on their behalf, to purchase weapons from a seized shipment.
Experts say this is a common method, and that weapons are often transported in multiple shipments of smaller quantities, a process called "ant trafficking."
Sending a shipment
The container was sent by a shipping company from Florida. Alliance International Shipping, says Haitian police.
Alliance International Shipping does not own vessels that travel to Haiti, but it buys space on ships and resells them to clients such as Predestin.
The company's president, Gregor Moraj, said in a statement to the BBC that he offers customers empty containers, but that there is no physical interaction with the cargo.
"Unfortunately, we don't have sustainable ways to prevent illegal shipments," he says, adding that the company is cooperating with authorities and has a number of staff members of Haitian origin.
"Tragically, many of our own families have been victims of gun violence in Haiti," he adds.
Leaving America
The BBC contacted US Customs and Border Protection to ask whether the shipment could have been inspected as it left America, but received no response.
A UN panel said in September last year that US searches had increased but that "the vast majority of the 200 containers that travel from South Florida to Haiti each week are not being inspected."
Checks on outbound cargo are "very patchy" and the volume of shipments is "unbelievable," Bill Kuhlman, a former official with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), told the BBC.
Arrival in Haiti
Haitian police say they discovered the weapons in a "targeted search" of a container.
According to the UN panel, a senior Haitian customs officer smuggled one of the boxes of weapons into his own vehicle and was arrested and fired a few days later.
Police say they were looking for a man named Villemain Jean, who was listed in customs records as the "consignee" for the shipment, which is the official name for someone responsible for taking delivery of it.
The BBC has learned from sources in Haiti that he is a customs broker, is on the run and is suspected of being linked to gang activities in the north of the country.
A previous United Nations report said Haiti's customs service suffers from a lack of capacity, corruption among senior officials, and threats and attacks by gangs.
The BBC's attempts to contact Haitian customs authorities for comment were unsuccessful.
Gang power
By the time the weapons were packed into the shipping container, a wave of gang violence had spread through the Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince.
Gangs freed thousands of prisoners from the main prison and blocked the capital's ports and airport.
In March 2024, Prime Minister Ariel Henry, who was unable to return from a visit abroad, agreed to resign.
A record 5.601 people were killed in gang violence in Haiti in 2024, according to the UN.
Its agencies say nearly a tenth of the population, more than a million people, have fled their homes, while half the population faces acute hunger.
Kidnappings and blackmail are common.
Wilson, a handyman from Port-au-Prince, was shot in the leg while trying to escape gang turf battles in his neighborhood.
"There was chaos, everyone was running out of their houses," he told the BBC.
"My leg wasn't listening to me anymore. When I looked down, I saw blood flowing from it."
He now lives with hundreds of other people in a school used as a shelter.
Experts say the authorities lack the capacity to regain control, despite support from international security forces, including at least 800 Kenyan police.
Gangs have been taking territory over the past six months and now control at least 85 percent of the capital, says Romain le Cour, a Haiti expert at the Global Initiative against Transnational Organized Crime, a non-governmental organization based in Geneva.
Gang members often pose on social media with large-caliber weapons in their hands.
Experts told the BBC that some of the weapons on display were definitely made in the US, while others were very likely also made there.
However, weapons and ammunition "continue to arrive," says Le Cour, which is "a massive instigator of violence and instability."
Hundreds of shipments
To investigate the potential scale of smuggling from the US using similar shipping routes, the BBC analysed customs data shared with us by freight forwarding data platform KargoFax.
We have compiled a list of individuals currently under sanctions for alleged gang ties in Haiti, and others who have been arrested in Haiti or the US as suspected arms dealers.
We compared those names to records of thousands of shipments from the US to Haiti over the past four years.
A total of 26 people on the list were listed as recipients of goods for 286 shipments, which were sent before the individuals were sanctioned or arrested.
It is not known whether these shipments contained weapons.
Listed 24 times as the recipient of the goods was Profaine Victor, a former member of the Haitian parliament who was later subject to UN and US sanctions for arming gangs and smuggling weapons.
He was arrested in Haiti in January.
Can smugglers be stopped?
"First and foremost, the American authorities are not doing enough," says Le Cour.
Kuhlman, a former US ATF official, says there is no legal obligation for gun dealers to report suspicious buyers.
Changing US gun laws is "politically really hard to achieve," he says, but he would like to see a voluntary code of conduct for firearms dealers that covers issues such as selling to suspicious buyers and sharing information.
Also, gun registration, similar to car registration, is in effect in several states and could be "really useful" if widely adopted, Kuhlman adds.
Jonathan Lowy, president of the Global Action Against Gun Violence, says gun manufacturers are notified when weapons are sold under investigation and know which dealers are selling weapons to smugglers.
"If manufacturers were to cut ties with these vendors, it would immediately shut down most smuggling routes from the US."
The BBC has contacted the ATF and the US Department of Homeland Security for comment, but has not received a response.
Le Cour says that international commitment to the problem has increased, but that there are no visible results: "We know we have the diagnosis, we know what the symptoms are, but we are not working on a cure."
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