‘Perfect murder’: Family of fishermen killed in U.S. airstrikes in the Caribbean speak out

Chad Joseph was among six people killed during U.S. military airstrikes on boats President Donald Trump claim were carrying drugs.

After U.S. airstrikes in the Caribbean on suspected drug boats left more than two dozen people dead, including a young fisherman, his family is demanding answers.

On Tuesday (Oct. 14), relatives of 26-year-old Chad Joseph said he was killed in an airstrike by the U.S. military along with another Trinidadian man, identified by some outlets as Rishi Samaroo, according to Reuters.

“Donald Trump took a father, a brother, an uncle, a nephew from families. Donald Trump don’t care what he is doing,” Joseph’s cousin, Afisha Clement, 41, told the outlet.

The Guardian reported both men were from Las Cuevas, a fishing village in northern Trinidad, and are believed to have been among six people killed in a U.S. strike on a vessel allegedly transporting drugs from Venezuela.

“If you say a boat has narcotics on it, where is the narcotics? We want evidence, we want proof. There is nothing,” Clement added.

Joseph’s great-uncle, Cecil McClean, 93, called the strike “perfect murder.” “There is nothing they could prove that they are coming across our waters with drugs,” he said. “How could Trump prove the boat was bringing narcotics?”

The strike was part of a series of U.S. military operations ordered by President Donald Trump in late summer targeting what his administration claims are “narcoterrorist” networks smuggling drugs from Venezuela, per the New York Times. The air and sea attacks—carried out by U.S. naval forces rather than the Coast Guard—have sparked international backlash, with at least 27 people killed so far. While the White House says the missions are meant to disrupt trafficking routes, it has yet to present evidence confirming narcotics were found, prompting outrage from Caribbean governments and human rights groups who say the actions overstep U.S. jurisdiction and endanger civilians.

Joseph’s relatives say he had recently moved to Venezuela to work as a fisherman and regularly crossed the waters between the two nations. They insist he was not involved in drug trafficking and believe the U.S. mistook fishermen for smugglers.

Trump has called those killed “narcoterrorists,” claiming “intelligence confirmed the vessel was trafficking narcotics.” But at a wake for Joseph and Samaroo, his cousin La Toya, 42, said the men were denied due process and accused Trinidad and Tobago’s government of surrendering its sovereignty to the U.S.

“Everybody have a right to due process and due process wasn’t given,” she said, per The Guardian. “It don’t look like we running under our government no more when it comes to the waters — that’s not Trinidad waters.”

At Joseph’s wake, relatives and neighbors remembered him as a devoted father, loving son, doting grandson, and hardworking fisherman who lived with his grandmother and made a living on the sea. They also said they felt betrayed by their government and powerless under a U.S. campaign they believe has gone unchecked. 

“I just want to know why Donald Trump killing poor people just so,” said Joseph’s uncle, known locally as “Dollars.” “Just because he going after the people gas and their oil. He going after people riches and killing poor people children.”