by Matthew Russell Lee, Patreon Book Substack
SDNY COURTHOUSE, July 20 – Venezuela's former spy chief Hugo Armando Carvajal Barrios a/k/a El Pollo is in US custody in a narco-trafficking conspiracy case begun in 2011, after a long extradition fight in Spain.
Carvajal is slated to be presented before U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York Magistrate Judge Stuart D. Aaron on July 20. Inner City Press daily covers that court, for example in the case of former Honduras president Juan Orlando Hernandez, and other fraudsters like Sam Bankman-Fried.
But El Pollo's case has the potential to spill the beans even more than Honduras' JOH's ongoing case, in which JOH's ties to El Chapo Guzman are alleged.
El Pollo told a Spanish judge that he has information about Venezuela - and drug money from Colombia's FARC - going to, among others, Brazil's President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva; Néstor Kirchner in Argentina; Evo Morales in Bolivia; Fernando Lugo in Paraguay; Ollanta Humala in Peru; Zelaya in Honduras; Gustavo Petro in Colombia; the Five Star Movement in Italy; and the Podemos party in Spain.
The wrinkle is that, given El Pollo's flip to Guaido, the Nicolas Maduro government is asking for his re-extradition. And as with the current US administration's prosecution of Miles Guo Wengui Kwok, who the Chinese government also wants prosecuted or worse, will DOJ be eager to cut the cooperation deal it should or might?
Inner City Press is on the case, which is US v. Carvajal Barrios, et al., 11-cr-205 (Hellerstein / Aaron)
More detail, and Spanish translation, on Substack here
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