CNN —Haiti’s crime rate has more than doubled since last year, as the Caribbean island nation faces widespread insecurity and gang violence, new data has revealed. More than a dozen people were lynched by a crowd in Haitian capital Port-au-Prince on Monday, on suspicion of being gang members, according to authorities. Residents who spoke to Reuters and AFP on camera said they believed the victims were gang members. Before the killing, Haitian National Police had stopped and searched the victims in a minibus in the neighborhood of Canape-Vert, seizing weapons and other equipment, according to a statement from the Haitian National Police. Gangs control wide swathes of Port-Au-Prince, plaguing residents with extreme violence as Haitians also grapple with extreme poverty and a humanitarian crisis.

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