Ex-Venezuelan President Maduro returning to federal court to face torture allegations

NEW YORK -- Former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife return Thursday to a New York courtroom to face a rewritten indictment accusing them of leading a state-sponsored campaign of repression that tortured scores of victims, including three Americans.

Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, were expected to plead not guilty in Manhattan federal court to charges added to a drug trafficking indictment brought months earlier against the two. They were seized from their Caracas home by the U.S. military in a nighttime raid in January.

Attorney Barry Pollack said when the charges were announced last week that Maduro, 63, denies them and “looks forward to his day in court.”

According to the rewritten indictment, Maduro oversaw a violent torture system that beat, asphyxiated, and delivered electric shocks to its victims. He is accused of personally recommending torture methods, receiving updates on specific victims’ treatment, and threatening to kill one prisoner’s child as a form of psychological torture.

Flores, 69, a former attorney general, helped develop the repressive system and ordered the torture of some specific people, the indictment alleges.

Maduro, who served as Venezuela’s president from 2013 until his capture in January, has been under investigation for years by the International Criminal Court over allegations of crimes against humanity, tied to his crackdown on opponents. He has always denied wrongdoing.

Earlier this year, Maduro and his wife pleaded not guilty in the U.S. drug case, which said they conspired to flood the U.S. with cocaine. Their attorneys say the case should be dismissed immunity grounds because they were the leader and first lady of a foreign country.

The revised indictment covers allegations of torture stretching back to Maduro’s ascent to power in 2013, when he took over as president from his mentor Hugo Chávez, who died of cancer that year.