Lima Charles-Pierre

From Philosopedia

Lima Charles-Pierre (20 December 1955 - 2 May 2003)

Lima Charles-Pierre was born in Fort-Liberté (Kreyòl: Fòlibète) in Haiti's Nord-Est Department, an area originally inhabited by Indians, then Spaniards. The city was founded in 1578 by the French, was occupied by the British in 1790, captured by Spanish forces in 1794, was restored to the French in 1801, and became independent when Haiti, the only nation born of a slave revolution, became independent. Its various name-changes include Bayaha (1578), Fort-Dauphin (1732), Fort St. Joseph (1804), Fort-Royal (1811), and Fort-Liberté (1820).

The town, which is part of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Fort-Liberté, is where Haiti's independence was proclaimed on 29 November 1803.

Records are incomplete, but he was the son of farmer Rude Charles-Pierre and Aristilia Francisque, whose children included Marcel, Lima (called Jack), Renaud, and Zette Benoit.

Fort-Liberté once was where, until nylon was invented, the largest sisal plantation in the Caribbean was found. As the area became occupied by Europeans, it flourished mainly as one that produced sugar-cane, coffee, cocoa, and cotton. Today, in addition, it produces coffee, honey, logwood, and pineapple.

At a young age Lima went from his family's residence in the Nord-Est, which is close to the border of the Dominican Republic, to the capital, Port-au-Prince, in the Ouest. He secured a position as one of the Presidential Guards during the regime of Jean-Claude Duvalier (known also as "Bébé Doc").

He and Lourdy married and had two daughters, Miriam and Sundia.

Emmeline Termonfils met Lima in 1989. She was with a friend trying to help a friend in jail and Lima helped her friend. He gave her his phone number, she called, they went to a beach somewhere, and that's how their affair started. Although not married, when he was 35 years and 8 months old, she gave birth on 17 September 1992 to Ligardy Olivier Termonfils.

With Nicole Noel, he had two sons, Jonathan and Joseph.

In February 1977, Lima saw a tourist, Warren Allen Smith, standing on the grass near the National Palace where he was not supposed to be, approached with his gun aimed between the tourist's eyes, and yelled Arrêtez, arrêtez! Learning that the tourist was not from Germany but from New York City, where his recording studio had recorded Haitiana and Frantz Casseus's Mèci Bon Dié, he was surprised that the tourist instead of being angry invited him for a beer, giving him his local bed and breakfast address. That evening when the b&b owner opened the door and found five of the President's Guards asking to come in, he was shocked, as was the tourist who exclaimed, "Monsieur le propriétaire, nous apportent la bière, vin, rhum, whiskey, quelque chose qu'ils veulent. Nous allons avoir une partie!" That party was the start of Lima's and the tourist's long friendship, and if the tourist had not taken a photograph (below) his New York City friends would never have believed him. Lima gave his address as "Charly Peter Lima, Palace National, 47e Cie, Port-au-Prince 2-2717." What the tourist, Smith who was raised in Iowa, remembers most was that they instantly clicked, as if they really were fellow farm boys.

Upon dissolution of Haiti's army, Charles-Pierre was hired to oversee a private company's security force of several people and, although asked to return to the Aristide government in some capacity related to the past storage of their ammunition, he declined. For no other reason, it would appear, he was waylaid while driving with others and assassinated by being hit by 37 bullets.

Lima had told Smith the tourist, "I wish we had been teenagers growing up on adjacent farms." Whatever that meant, Smith upon learning of Lima's assassination in 2003 has ever since helped raise Lima's teenage son, Ligardy Olivier Termonfils.