After mass public protests, Avril transferred power to the army chief of staff, Gen. Hérard Abraham, on March 10, 1990. Avril went into exile in Miami, Florida; he moved to the Dominican Republic after he was refused entry into Haiti in 1992. He returned to Haiti in 1993. He fled again in 1995 after the Haitian government moved to arrest him in connection with the assassination of a government official during his time in power. He was finally arrested in 2001, shortly after Jean-Bertrand Aristide was elected President, for allegedly plotting against the state. Avril was released in 2002 after an appeals court ruled that the government presented "insufficient evidence"; he was immediately rearrested and charged with organizing a 1990 massacre of farmers. He was freed after Aristide was ousted in the 2004 Haitian coup d'état.