{"id":175630,"date":"2026-03-26T05:59:10","date_gmt":"2026-03-26T05:59:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/175630\/"},"modified":"2026-03-26T05:59:10","modified_gmt":"2026-03-26T05:59:10","slug":"ousted-venezuelan-president-maduro-to-appear-in-new-york-court","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/175630\/","title":{"rendered":"Ousted Venezuelan president Maduro to appear in New York court"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ousted Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro<\/a> will appear on Thursday in a New York court for the second time since his capture by US forces<\/a> in an extraordinary nighttime raid.<\/p>\n

Maduro, 63, and his wife Cilia Flores have been held in a Brooklyn jail for almost three months after American commandos seized the pair from their compound in Caracas in early January.<\/p>\n

The stunning operation deposed the strongman who had led Venezuela<\/a> since 2013 and has since forced the oil-rich country to largely bend to the will of US President Donald Trump<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Maduro has declared himself a \u201cprisoner of war\u201d and pleaded not guilty to four counts: conspiracy for \u201cnarco-terrorism<\/a>,\u201d conspiracy to import cocaine, possession of machine guns and destructive devices, and conspiracy to possess machine guns and destructive devices.<\/p>\n

Thursday\u2019s hearing at 11:00 am (1500 GMT) is likely to see Maduro push for the dismissal of his case, as lawyers tussle over who will pay the former leader\u2019s legal fees. Venezuela\u2019s government is seeking to cover the costs, but because of Washington\u2019s sanctions, his lawyer Barry Pollack must obtain a US licence that has not yet been issued.<\/p>\n

Pollack argued in a court submission that the licence requirement violated Maduro\u2019s constitutional right to legal representation and demanded the case be thrown out on procedural grounds.<\/p>\n

Read moreUS, Venezuela restore diplomatic relations as Washington pushes for access to minerals<\/a><\/p>\n

Deadly raid <\/p>\n

Detained in Brooklyn\u2019s Metropolitan Detention Center, a federal prison known for unsanitary conditions, Maduro is reportedly alone in a cell with no access to the internet or newspapers. A source close to the Venezuelan government said the incarcerated Maduro reads the Bible and is referred to as \u201cpresident\u201d by some of his fellow detainees.<\/p>\n

He is only allowed to communicate by phone with his family and lawyers for a maximum of 15 minutes per call, the source added.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe lawyers told us he is strong. He said we must not be sad,\u201d said his son, Nicolas Maduro Guerra, adding that his father told him: \u201cWe are fine, we are fighters.\u201d<\/p>\n

Maduro and his wife were forcibly taken by US<\/a> commandos in the early hours of 3 January in airstrikes on the Venezuelan capital, backed by warplanes and a heavy naval deployment. At least 83 people died and more than 112 were injured in the assault, according to Venezuelan officials. No US service members were killed.<\/p>\n

Read moreRubio defends Maduro capture to Caribbean leaders amid rising tensions over Cuba<\/a><\/p>\n

US pressure <\/p>\n

At his first US court appearance in January, Maduro struck a defiant tone as he identified himself as the president of Venezuela despite being captured.<\/p>\n

The South American country is now led by Delcy Rodriguez<\/a>, who had been Maduro\u2019s vice president since 2018. Under US pressure, she is grappling with leading a country saddled with the world\u2019s largest proven oil reserves but an economy in shambles.<\/p>\n

Rodriguez has since enacted a historic amnesty law<\/a> to free political prisoners jailed under Maduro and reformed oil<\/a> and mining regulations in line with US demands for access to her country\u2019s vast natural wealth. This month, the State Department said it was restoring diplomatic ties with Venezuela in a sign of thawing relations.<\/p>\n

Security is expected to be heightened around the New York courthouse for Thursday\u2019s hearing. Presiding over the case is Alvin Hellerstein, a 92-year-old judge credited with overseeing several high-profile trials during his decades on the bench.<\/p>\n

(FRANCE 24 with AFP)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ousted Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro will appear on Thursday in a New York court for the second time…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":175631,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[10344,71361,153,71360,9,11,10,15862,820,7318],"class_list":["post-175630","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-americas","tag-delcy-rodriguez","tag-donald-trump","tag-maduros-capture","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news","tag-nicolas-maduro","tag-usa","tag-venezuela"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/175630","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=175630"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/175630\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/175631"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=175630"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=175630"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=175630"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}