Maduro and Wife Plead Not Guilty in Manhattan to Added Torture-Conspiracy Charge; Trial Moved to June 2027
Former Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, appeared in federal court in Manhattan on October 15 and pleaded not guilty to a charge of conspiracy to commit torture that prosecutors added last month, Reuters reported. U.S. District Judge Alvin Hellerstein entered their not-guilty pleas on the record.
It was the couple's third appearance in the court since U.S. forces captured them in January and brought them to the United States, Reuters reported. Listening through a Spanish-language interpreter, both said they understood the charge. Judge Hellerstein also announced that the trial would be postponed again, with jury selection now set to begin on June 14, 2027, instead of March 17, 2027, and asked both sides to confirm on the record that the delay did not violate the defendants' rights under the Speedy Trial Act.
Court records list Barry Pollack as counsel for Maduro and Mark Donnelly as counsel for Flores, with assistant U.S. attorneys appearing for the prosecution.
The case stems from the U.S. Justice Department's 2020 "narco-terrorism" indictment of Maduro and others, which GSM traced in its October 8 report: prosecutors alleged that Maduro and his associates partnered with Colombian rebels to flood the United States with cocaine. After the couple was brought to the U.S. in January, the case entered the federal court process, and the torture-conspiracy charge was added this fall.
Source: GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：位于纽约曼哈顿的丹尼尔·帕特里克·莫伊尼汉美国联邦法院大楼，本案在此审理（资料图）。Ken Lund 摄，CC BY-SA 2.0，维基共享资源 / Photo: The Daniel Patrick Moynihan United States Courthouse in Manhattan, where the case is being heard (file photo). Ken Lund, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
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- 2026-10-16Maduro and Wife Plead Not Guilty in Manhattan to Added Torture-Conspiracy Charge; Trial Moved to June 2027This story
