9th missionary freed in Haiti, returns to U.S.

Charisa Coulter and Laura Silsby were the last two missionaries still in custody of 10 that were arrested for trying to take 33 children out of Haiti after the earthquake. The other eight were released Feb. 17.

Coulter, 24, was freed Monday and whisked from her jail cell to the airport by U.S. Embassy staff.

Wearing a red tank top and sunglasses, she declined comment as she quickly got into an SUV that took her to the Haitian airport, where she caught a flight back to the United States.

Coulter's father said his daughter arrived in Miami late Monday and went straight to a hotel.

Mel Coulter said her release brought a mix of joy and sorrow, because the leader of the Idaho-based missionary group, Silsby, was left spending the night alone in a Haitian jail.

“It is good news, but it's tempered,” Coulter said. “We're really happy to have our daughter back on American soil. But Laura is still there. So this is really only completing part of the journey for the two of them. My daughter has left her best friend behind.”

He did not say when his daughter would head to her home in Boise, Idaho.

Silsby, 40, said she was glad about Coulter's release.

“I'm very happy that she left today, and for her freedom, and expect mine to come soon,” Silsby told The Associated Press as she left the courthouse where a judge held a closed hearing Monday. She was returned to her cell in a police station near Port-au-Prince airport.

Defense lawyer Louis Ricardo Chachoute said Coulter was released because there was no evidence to support the charges of kidnapping and criminal association. He predicted Silsby would be released soon as well.

“There are no prosecution witnesses to substantiate anything,” Chachoute said.

Coulter is a diabetic and had medical difficulties during her confinement. She was treated at least once, on Feb. 1, by American doctors after collapsing from what she said was either severe dehydration or the flu.

After the hearing Monday for Silsby, Judge Bernard Saint-Vil said he heard evidence from a police officer who said he stopped Silsby from loading a bus with children near the Dominican Republic consulate in Port-au-Prince on Jan. 26. That was three days before her group was arrested while trying to cross into the Dominican Republic with 33 children.

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