Trial on all charges against Maduro, Flores set for June 2027
A US superseding indictment unsealed Thursday accuses Cilia Flores, the wife of Venezuela’s former leader Nicolás Maduro, of ordering the torture of specific prisoners to protect family members involved in illegal activities. The new conspiracy-to-commit-torture charge adds to drug-trafficking and weapons counts already pending against the couple, who have been held at a Brooklyn detention center since US forces seized them in a pre-dawn raid on their Caracas compound in January.
The indictment accuses the former presidential couple of “entrenching themselves in power” by presiding “over a system of repression that relied on violence against political opposition, arbitrary detention, and the torture of detainees, including United States citizens.” According to the court document, the alleged torture comprised “electric shock, asphyxiation, rape, forced nudity, prolonged isolation, starvation, punishment cells, and psychological torture.” Prosecutors allege the psychological component included threats to kill victims’ family members, including children. The motivation behind the repression, according to the indictment, was to ensure that Maduro and Flores remained in power.
The prosecution accuses Flores, 69, of playing a key role in the development of the repressive system. The court document alleges she ordered that individuals be tortured and received updates on the torture of specific prisoners, doing so in order to protect members of her family who were involved in illegal activities.
Maduro, 63, and Flores have been in US custody since January in a detention center in Brooklyn, where they were taken after US forces seized them in a pre-dawn raid on their compound in the Venezuelan capital, Caracas. The couple has denied the drug-trafficking and weapons charges brought earlier. The trial for both defendants is set to begin in June 2027.
Human rights groups in Venezuela and former prisoners have long denounced what they have described as “systematic torture” in Venezuelan jails. The allegations in the superseding indictment echo accusations long made by prisoners who have been released from detention.
Javier Tarazona, the head of a Venezuelan human rights group, told BBC Mundo’s Norberto Paredes earlier this year how he and his brother were held in a tiny punishment cell for 46 days after being arbitrarily arrested. Another former inmate, Ángel Godoy, told BBC Mundo that he was kept isolated for months and not allowed to contact his wife, who was in turn kept in the dark about his whereabouts.