Prosecutors in New York may bring new charges against Venezuela’s former president Nicolás Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores in connection with the alleged torture of Americans who have been held in custody by the Venezuelan government in recent years, several people familiar with the investigation told CNN.
According to sources, an announcement of the new charges could come as early as Thursday. They relate to the unlawful detention of more than a dozen US citizens in Venezuelan prisons during Maduro’s time in power.
According to a source familiar with the case, investigators have also discussed the possibility of charging several other people over their alleged role in the torture of Americans.
Maduro and his wife were seized during a US military operation in January at the presidential palace in Caracas. They pleaded not guilty to conspiracy to commit narco-terrorism and other offences and are being held in custody in New York without bail.
Flores is expected to appear in court on Thursday, where her lawyer will ask for her to be transferred to house arrest pending trial. Maduro’s lawyer is challenging the legality of his arrest and argues that the former president has immunity because the alleged crimes were committed while he was in office.
According to prosecutors, the Venezuelan government has not joined the request to grant Maduro immunity.
More than a dozen Americans were detained by Maduro’s government, which the United States and human rights advocates accused of using them as political hostages.
Some of the Americans described torture that they say they endured while imprisoned. Matthew Heath and Osman Khan, freed in a prisoner swap in October 2022, alleged they were subjected to waterboarding, electric shocks, threats of sexual violence, psychoactive drugs and prolonged solitary confinement. Heath, a former US Marine, attempted suicide while in custody.
The so-called “CITGO Six” — a group of six American oil company executives who were lured to Venezuela in 2017 and held there for nearly five years — also say they suffered ill-treatment while imprisoned in Venezuela.
In lawsuits against their employer, Citgo, Tomeu Vadell, Alirio Jose Zambrano and Jose Luis Zambrano said they were tortured while in detention.
All of them were held at Venezuela’s General Directorate of Military Counterintelligence (DGCIM), which, according to a UN report, was responsible for arbitrary detentions, ill-treatment and torture of political opponents and their family members. The UN report says DGCIM regularly resorted to torture, including electric shocks, suffocation with plastic bags, waterboarding, beatings, sexual violence, deprivation of water and food, being forced to remain in painful positions and exposure to extreme temperatures.
According to the UN, these methods were used to “obtain information and confessions, intimidate and punish detainees”.