Former Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, will go on trial on June 1 for drug trafficking charges, a judge said Wednesday. Maduro, 63, and Flores, 69, have been held at a Brooklyn jail since U.S. forces seized them from their Caracas home in a middle-of-the-night raid and brought them to New York in early January.
Trial Details
Under the approved schedule, defense lawyers will begin filing requests in early September to challenge the indictment, and the couple will return to the courtroom on November 17 for oral arguments on the motions. Maduro and Flores have pleaded not guilty and face potential life prison sentences if a jury agrees that they were part of a conspiracy to send cocaine into the U.S.
Maduro’s lawyer, Barry Pollack, has said he expects to contest the legality of Maduro’s ‘military abduction.’ The lawyers have said there are complex legal defenses that the court must address before a trial can begin.
Original reporting: WTVQ (Lexington) — read the source article.
