Benjamin Reuben Zalman-Polun, left, Marcel Malanga and Tyler Thompson, all Americans, attend a courtroom verdict in DRC, Kinshasa, on costs of collaborating in a coup try in Could 2024.
Samy Ntumba Shambuyi/AP
conceal caption
toggle caption
Samy Ntumba Shambuyi/AP
KINSHASA, Democratic Republic of Congo — A army tribunal within the Democratic Republic of Congo on Friday handed down dying sentences to 37 folks, together with three US residents, for his or her position in a failed coup within the central African nation this summer time.
“The court pronounces the strongest sentence: the death penalty,” stated Main Freddy Ehume, the president of the tribunal, which was held below a Khaki-green tent within the courtyard of the capital Kinshasa’s Ndolo army jail.
The sentencing ends three months of hearings into the occasions of Could 19, when a gaggle of armed males led by Congolese political exile and longtime US resident Christian Malanga staged an bungled try and overthrow the federal government of President Felix Tshisekedi.
That evening, Malanga and a number of other dozen males first attacked the house of senior politician Important Kamerhe, an in depth Tshisekedi ally, within the capital Kinshasa, earlier than invading a sprawling presidential advanced within the metropolis heart. There, based on footage Malanga reside streamed on social media, they unfurled flags and chanted anti-government slogans.
However Congolese troops shortly took again management — killing Malanga within the course of. He was one in all at the least six individuals who misplaced their lives through the coup try, based on the Congolese. Harmless victims had been additionally killed. A safety guard posted to Kamerhe’s home was shot lifeless, as was a person whom the group stopped at random on the street with the intention to steal his jeep.
Within the fast aftermath of the coup, safety forces caught three Individuals, together with dozens of others, on the banks of the close by Congo River, attempting to flee the presidential advanced.
Christian Malanga’s son, 22-year-old Marcel Malanga, was amongst these caught. As was his shut good friend from Utah, 21-year-old Tyler Thompson, and one other American, 36-year-old Maryland native Benjamin Zalman-
Polun.
Thompson’s household had advised reporters they believed their son was on trip.
Footage that circulated on social media — and which was proven through the subsequent trial hearings — instructed the brutal situations of their arrest. In a single video, Zalman-Polun lies bare on the planks of a riverboat as excited and screaming troopers shoot a person attempting to swim away.
Congolese safety forces rounded up dozens of individuals within the aftermath of the tried coup, inserting a complete of 51 folks on trial in Kinshasa on costs of homicide, terrorism, prison affiliation, amongst others, which carry the dying penalty.
Though it formally saved capital punishment on the books, Congo had maintained a decades-long moratorium on the dying penalty till March, when the federal government lifted the measure in a bid to root out what it termed ‘treachery’.
American Marcel Malanga, fourth proper, stands with others throughout a courtroom verdict in DRC, Kinshasa, Friday Sept .13, 2024, on costs of collaborating in a coup try in Could 2024.
Samy Ntumba Shambuyi/AP
conceal caption
toggle caption
Samy Ntumba Shambuyi/AP
The coup trial in Kinshasa’s Ndolo army jail started in June, after a interval of a number of weeks during which the defendants had been held incommunicado. Known as earlier than the bar, many testified to having been tortured by army intelligence brokers in detention.
Youssouff Ezangi, a Congolese-born British nationwide whom the Congolese authorities introduced as one of many coup’s foremost leaders, initially appeared in courtroom along with his arms lined in black bruises.
The US residents additionally testified that their statements had been extracted below duress, and with out the presence of an interpreter. “At the first underground place we were at, we were getting beaten and tortured,” stated Marcel Malanga, calmly, throughout one courtroom listening to in August.
All through the trial, the defendants, like Tyler Thompson, principally caught to the identical story – that Christian Malanga compelled them to participate.
Based on Thompson, Christian Malanga woke him up on the evening of the tried coup and threatened him at gunpoint.
“He had not said anything about any of this happening until that night,” he advised the courtroom. ” To my knowledge we were here on vacation to meet him, so I did not see him as a threat. The only thing he told me is that I must do everything as he says or else I will die.”
Translation issues also plagued the trial’s opening, with the first army-provided interpreter barely able to understand basic English. The accused US citizens are unable to speak either Congo’s official language of government, French, or Kinshasa’s dominant language Lingala.
The three Individuals, nevertheless, gave the identical account of the occasions of the evening of Could 19, telling the courtroom that Christian Malanga had compelled them to participate at gunpoint, and that that they had feared for his or her lives.
Many of the Congolese nationals supplied an identical story. Primarily recruited from western Congo, the bulk stated that Christian Malanga had employed them to work for his NGO, mentioning nothing about his political goals.
However the courtroom dismissed this protection, and it did not immediately reply to arguments by protection attorneys that testimony extracted below torture is illegitimate.
51 defendants confronted a army tribunal within the DRC after an tried coup in Could 2024.
ARSENE MPIANA/AFP
conceal caption
toggle caption
ARSENE MPIANA/AFP
On Friday, the courtroom discovered each member of the alleged attacking group — together with the three US residents; one Canadian; and Ezangi, the British nationwide — responsible on all counts.
Jean-Jacques Wondo, a Belgian nationwide who didn’t participate within the assault, was additionally condemned to dying, for allegedly being the “intellectual author” of the occasions. A former advisor to the Congolese secret service, the authorities accuse him of wiping his phone the day after the assault and of getting maintained contact with Malanga by an middleman. He, in addition to all the opposite defendants, fiercely contested the declare.
Fourteen folks, principally these rounded up mistakenly after the coup try, had been acquitted. Ehume, the tribunal president, stated that he and the 4 different judges had arrived at their resolution by a secret poll.
However one protection lawyer within the coup case, who declined to be named to guard his shopper, was deeply skeptical. “This was superficial, the court didn’t delve into the heart of the case,” the lawyer stated. “They had a decision in their pocket.”
The counsel for Marcel Malanga, Sylva Mbikayi, stated he was “stupefied” by the sentence and vowed to attraction. “This is a shameful decision, stained by a lot of bad faith on the part of the tribunal”.
