Kenscoff gang attack death toll rises to 45 as City declares three days of mourning

The death toll from last weekend’s gang attack on Kenscoff has climbed to at least 45, according to an update from The National Human Rights Defense Network (RNDDH), as the government moved this week to pledge a stronger security response and the municipality declared three days of mourning.

The RNDDH said in a note published Wednesday that 45 people were killed and 23 others wounded in the overnight assault of August 23-24, carried out by gunmen from the Viv Ansanm coalition against downtown Kenscoff. The group said it gathered the information from multiple witnesses and cautioned that the toll remains provisional, since access problems in the affected areas have made it impossible to verify all the information collected so far.

The figure marks a sharp rise from initial estimates. Kenscoff Mayor Jean Massillon told Reuters on the day after the attack that at least 30 people had been killed, a number RNDDH itself first placed in a range of 30 to 40 dead and 15 to 20 wounded. RNDDH also reported that more than 50 people were abducted during the raid and that several homes were burned; the United Nations cited a similar abduction figure on August 25.

According to RNDDH, the attackers moved on Kenscoff’s town center after gathering in several outlying localities, including Viard, Godet and Furcy. The group said a security guard employed at the Kenscoff mayor’s office was among those killed.

The rights group described the assault as part of a longer pattern of violence in Kenscoff rather than an isolated event, tracing it back to the town’s first major gang assault in late January 2025. It said pregnant women, children and elderly residents have been forced to flee their homes without what it called effective protection from the authorities, and it called on the government to take urgent measures to protect civilians, document the killings and identify and prosecute those responsible.

The Kenscoff municipal council has declared three days of mourning for the victims, running from August 31 to September 2.

The violence in Kenscoff, a hillside town overlooking Port-au-Prince that has faced repeated gang attacks over the past two years, comes as Haiti continues to struggle to contain armed groups despite the deployment of the Gang Suppression Force and continued operations by the PNH and Haitian Armed Forces (FAd’H).

According to the UN Integrated Office in Haiti (BINUH), at least 1,642 people were killed and 745 wounded in gang-related violence in the first three months of 2026 alone.

This is a developing story. Faces of Haiti will continue to follow developments in Kenscoff.