The trial of ousted Venezuelan president Nicol\u00e1s Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, is scheduled to begin on 1 June 2027, a New York judge ordered on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
US forces seized Maduro and Flores from their compound in the Venezuelan capital, Caracas, in a dramatic, night-time raid on 3 January, and brought them to New York to face allegations of weapon and drug offences, which they deny. <\/p>\n
Judge Alvin Hellerstein scheduled a pre-trial hearing for 17 November to hear motions from both parties.<\/p>\n
Maduro’s attorney Barry Pollack signalled that he will argue at trial that his client was protected by sovereign immunity, a legal principle shielding heads of state from prosecution.<\/p>\n
The courtroom was packed with spectators, with some people lining up for hours for the chance to glimpse Maduro in person.<\/p>\n
Before the hearing began, a court officer warned the public to remain seated and that that they “can’t say anything to him.”<\/p>\n
Anyone who disobeyed decorum “might have some legal issues of your own,” the officer warned.<\/p>\n
The gallery mostly follows his instructions as Maduro and Flores were led into the chamber shortly after noon, but some murmured or inhaled breath as he walked past.<\/p>\n
Maduro, who wore a beige jail uniform but was not handcuffed, gave the gallery a nod as he walked to his seat at the defence table.<\/p>\n
He and Flores sat quietly, wearing headphones for translation while their attorneys conferred with the judge.<\/p>\n
When it was time to leave, Maduro stood. He faced the public and gave a single wave of his hands, before disappearing into the bowels of the courthouse in the custody of US Marshalls.<\/p>\n
Outside the courtroom, anti-war protesters condemned the US military operation that resulted in Maduro’s capture, holding up signs that read “Free President Maduro,” and decrying, in the words of one protester with a bullhorn, the “sham trial” taking place inside.<\/p>\n
“The US is endeavouring to bring Venezuela, Latin America, and the Middle East under its thumb,” said a speaker with the Anti-War Action Network.<\/p>\n
Some Venezuelans, draped in the country’s flag, supported the prosecution.<\/p>\n
“Maduro is a criminal,” said Wilmer Contreras, 53, who moved to the US about 30 years ago. “He’s a part of the government, they destroyed my country completely.”<\/p>\n
Contreras said he “absolutely” supported the Trump administration’s military capture of Maduro.<\/p>\n
“What they did was something that we were expecting, and waiting for, for a long time. And when that happened, things changed in my country,” he told the BBC.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The trial of ousted Venezuelan president Nicol\u00e1s Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, is scheduled to begin on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":705891,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,50,51,47,52,48],"class_list":["post-705890","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/705890","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=705890"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/705890\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/705891"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=705890"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=705890"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=705890"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}