The Justice Department on Thursday indicted two Texas men on charges they plotted to kill all the men on a small island off the coast of Haiti so they could enslave the remaining women and children as sex slaves.
Prosecutors also allege the conspirators planned to sail to the island and overthrow the local government there with the help of a mercenary army made up of homeless people from Washington, D.C.
Gavin Weisenburg, 21, of the Dallas suburb of Allen, and Tanner Thomas, 20, of Argyle, another North Texas bedroom community — are charged with conspiracy to murder, maim or kidnap in a foreign country and production of child pornography. They face life in prison on the conspiracy charge and 15 to 30 years on the child-porn charge.
Prosecutors allege Weisenburg and Thomas hatched the bizarre plot in August 2024 and went to great lengths to turn what federal prosecutors described as their “rape fantasies” into reality.
Attorneys representing Thomas and Weisenburg told NPR that the government’s allegations are overblown and that both their clients intend to plead not guilty.
According to federal prosecutors, the men planned to pilot a sailboat to Gonave — a Haitian island of about 87,000 people located 30 miles off the coast of Port-au-Prince — and overthrow the local government. They planned to kill all the men and enslave the women and children, according to court documents.
The pair planned to carry out the feat with the help of a mercenary army, in part, made up of homeless people recruited from the streets of Washington, D.C., prosecutors allege.
Thomas enlisted in the U.S. Air Force and asked to be reassigned to Joint Base Andrews, near D.C., so he could recruit and learn necessary skills for the coup, the feds maintain.
Meanwhile, Weisenburg enrolled in the North Texas Fire Academy to train in command-and-control protocols, skills he would need for the operation, according to authorities. He flunked out six months later.
Weisenburg subsequently flew to Thailand to enroll in a sailing school so he could captain the boat to Gonave, prosecutors allege. However, that didn’t work out either, since the classes were too expensive.
At some point, both Thomas and Weisenburg began learning Haitian Creole, according to the feds’ court document, which also accuse the pair of creating child pornography.
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