The outstanding legal case towards Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, who was captured by U.S. forces in Caracas on Jan. 3, is already underway in New York Metropolis. Maduro will not be the primary international chief to face trial in the USA, however his case continues to be controversial and strange.
Whereas a lot stays up within the air and this authorized drama has solely simply begun, right here’s what we all know and don’t know in regards to the case towards Maduro thus far.
The costs. The indictment towards Maduro, which additionally contains his spouse, Cilia Flores, and 4 different people, alleges that he and different Venezuelan leaders “abused their positions of public belief and corrupted once-legitimate establishments to import tons of cocaine into the USA” for greater than 25 years.
The indictment was filed within the U.S. District Court docket of the Southern District of New York. Maduro was indicted on 4 counts: narcoterrorism conspiracy, cocaine importation conspiracy, possession of machine weapons and damaging gadgets, and conspiracy to own machine weapons and damaging gadgets. The narcoterrorism fees embody alleged cooperation with Colombian paramilitary teams such because the FARC and ELN, Mexican drug gangs together with the Sinaloa Cartel, and the ever present Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua. He may resist life in jail if convicted.
In the meantime, the indictment accuses Flores of accepting bribes in 2007 to dealer a gathering between a “large-scale drug trafficker” and the director of Venezuela’s Nationwide Anti-Drug Workplace. The U.S. criticism additionally alleges that Maduro and Flores “ordered kidnappings, beatings, and murders towards those that owed them drug cash or in any other case undermined their drug trafficking operation, together with ordering the homicide of an area drug boss in Caracas, Venezuela.”
The indictment revises and builds on a 2020 indictment towards Maduro that accused him of heading the so-called “Cartel de los Soles,” which specialists have emphasised will not be an precise group however a slang time period for corrupt Venezuelan officers who settle for drug cash.
Notably, whereas the 2020 indictment explicitly accuses Maduro of main the Cartel de los Soles, the 2026 indictment drops this assertion and now not refers to it as a corporation however a “patronage system.” The 2020 indictment talked about the Cartel de los Soles a complete of 32 occasions, whereas the brand new criticism solely mentions it twice.
The Trump administration has repeatedly referenced the Cartel de los Soles in public remarks main as much as and after Maduro’s seize. In remarks to the U.N. Safety Council on Jan. 5, for instance, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Mike Waltz mentioned Maduro is “the pinnacle of a vicious international terrorist group Cartel de los Soles.” However the Trump administration is seemingly abandoning such assertions within the authorized proceedings towards Maduro.
The 2026 indictment additionally differs in that it provides new co-defendants, together with Flores. Among the many others charged are Maduro’s son, Nicolás Ernesto Maduro Guerra, and Héctor Rusthenford Guerrero Flores, the chief of Tren de Aragua.
The choose. U.S. District Court docket Decide Alvin Hellerstein, a 92-year-old who has been on the bench for shut to a few many years, is presiding over the trial. Hellerstein, a Clinton appointee, has a historical past of ruling towards U.S. President Donald Trump. Final spring, for instance, Hellerstein barred the Trump administration from deporting migrants beneath the Alien Enemies Act.
“That is the USA of America,” Hellerstein mentioned on the time. “Persons are being thrown overseas due to their tattoos.”
The prosecutors. The U.S. Lawyer’s Workplace for the Southern District of New York, which is led by U.S. Lawyer Jay Clayton, is prosecuting the case. Clayton, who chaired the U.S. Securities and Trade Fee within the first Trump administration, signed the indictment towards Maduro and his spouse.
Amanda Houle, the chief of the workplace’s legal division, can also be on the case. Houle was among the many lead prosecutors within the 2020 case towards Maduro.
Assistant U.S. Lawyer Kyle Wirshba spoke on behalf of the federal government at Maduro’s arraignment on Jan. 5. Wirshba was additionally concerned within the 2020 indictment of Maduro.
The protection. Maduro is being represented by Barry Pollack, an skilled Washington-based lawyer with a historical past of involvement in high-profile circumstances. Pollack, who early in his profession garnered the nickname “Pit Bull” for his tenacity, represented WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange and negotiated the plea deal that noticed him launched from a British jail. He additionally beforehand secured the acquittal of former Enron accountant Michael Krautz.
Mark Donnelly, a Houston-based lawyer, is representing Flores. Donnelly, a lawyer with the agency Parker Sanchez & Donnelly, beforehand labored for the U.S. Justice Division for greater than a decade, together with as a senior advisor to the U.S. lawyer for the Southern District of Texas, in response to his on-line biography.
What’s occurred thus far. Maduro and Flores have been arraigned on Jan. 5 in Manhattan. They pleaded not responsible. “I’m harmless. I’m not responsible. I’m an honest man. I’m nonetheless president of my nation,” Maduro mentioned, talking by an interpreter. Their subsequent courtroom date is March 17.
Hellerstein vowed to present Maduro a good trial. “That’s my job, and that’s my intent,” Hellerstein mentioned.
The proof. Maduro is regarded throughout a lot of the world as a corrupt, illegitimate, and undemocratic chief whose insurance policies and actions fomented widespread struggling in Venezuela for years, which the Trump administration has repeatedly famous in justifying its operation to seize him. However Maduro will not be on trial in the USA for stealing elections or his remedy of the Venezuelan folks.
That mentioned, the Trump administration has but to supply exhausting proof to again up lots of its allegations towards Maduro, notably these relating to drug trafficking. Authorized specialists have expressed doubts that the federal government has sufficient direct proof to again up its fees towards Maduro relating to cocaine trafficking and narcoterrorism. Lengthy story brief, securing a drug trafficking conviction towards Maduro might be extraordinarily troublesome.
Alongside these strains, it’s price reiterating that the general public feedback the administration continues to make towards Maduro in relation to the “Cartel de los Soles” don’t match up with what’s within the indictment itself. The indictment additionally hyperlinks Maduro to legal gangs akin to Tren de Aragua, however the U.S. intelligence neighborhood final yr reportedly assessed that the Venezuelan authorities was not directing the gang and that the gang wasn’t committing crimes in the USA on the Venezuelan authorities’s orders.
Whether or not or not the contradictions between the administration’s public statements and allegations towards Maduro will trigger points for the federal government afterward within the proceedings stays to be seen.
If any of the proof the federal government has is assessed, this might additionally complicate the case for prosecutors and delay the method. The protection may search to strain the federal government into revealing delicate info to strain the prosecution into dropping fees—a tactic generally known as “graymail.”
The primary check: sovereign immunity argument. One of many first questions raised by the kidnapping and trial of Maduro is the legality of placing a head of state within the dock out of the country, and certainly that was the primary argument made by protection lawyer Pollack in Maduro’s arraignment listening to. There are literally two questions, each foreshadowed within the 1990 seize of Panamanian strongman Manuel Noriega and his subsequent trial in the USA.
The primary is whether or not it’s authorized for the USA to forcibly seize a head of state and spirit him away to face justice; virtually at all times bilateral extradition treaties are the popular method to deal with such issues.
However in 1989, the U.S. Justice Division decided that it had the fitting to grab even a head of state if that individual was beneath indictment in the USA and authorized extradition was not an choice (because it was not within the circumstances of Noriega and Maduro). The argument about improper seize didn’t fly in Noriega’s trial and certain received’t right here; at any price, courts usually defer to a authorized doctrine that claims the means by which a defendant is apprehended don’t a lot matter so long as due course of is noticed within the trial itself.
The second is a bit trickier as a result of on the time of his seize Maduro was serving as Venezuela’s president, whereas Noriega was not legally Panama’s president however merely a dictator. However “President” Maduro carries a caveat: The US (and about 50 different nations) deemed him illegitimate and never the true president of Venezuela after widespread fraud within the 2024 elections, which he misplaced in a landslide. The US argues in its indictment that Maduro was not the pinnacle of state.
Nonetheless, his successor, former Vice President and now performing President Delcy Rodríguez, mentioned in her first public feedback that Maduro remained the nation’s rightful president. If Venezuela argues earlier than the courtroom that Maduro is the authentic president and thus enjoys sovereign immunity, that might complicate the early phases of the case. Pollack has promised to pursue that line vigorously.
Different related circumstances. There are a few earlier circumstances of Venezuelan officers who confronted U.S. federal fees much like these going through Maduro: Hugo “El Pollo” Carvajal, a former Venezuelan intelligence official, and Clíver Alcalá, a former Venezuelan normal. Like Maduro, each have been charged with narcoterrorism and trafficking in addition to cooperating with the FARC.
Carvajal, who was arrested (greater than as soon as) in Spain and ultimately extradited to the USA in 2023, pleaded responsible to all fees in June 2025; he faces as much as 50 years in jail. Alcalá turned himself in to U.S. officers whereas in Colombia in 2020, was extradited, after which organized a plea deal that dropped the narcotics fees for the seemingly lesser fees of cooperating with terrorists; he acquired a 21-year sentence.
However there are nonetheless a few puzzling features in regards to the U.S. operation and the present case. Diosdado Cabello is the highly effective Venezuelan inside minister named in the identical indictment as Maduro however who at the moment serves to take care of the nascent rump regime of Rodríguez. The US has reportedly warned Cabello that he may share Maduro’s destiny except he steers Caracas in a U.S.-friendly path.
Vladimir Padrino López, who continues to be Venezuela’s protection minister within the regime that Washington is at the moment working with, can also be needed by the USA and is beneath indictment on cocaine trafficking fees.
And naturally, one other former Latin American head of state, ex-Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández, was extradited to the USA, tried, and sentenced to 45 years in jail for trafficking tons of cocaine. However Trump, who made combating drug trafficking the centerpiece of his marketing campaign towards Venezuela, pardoned Hernandez in December, saying final Saturday that he had been handled “unfairly.”
