Former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro returns to a New York courtroom Thursday as he seeks to have his drug trafficking indictment thrown out over a geopolitical dispute over legal fees.
It’s the first time that Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, will be in court since a January arraignment at which he protested their capture by U.S. military forces and declared: “I am not guilty. I am a decent man, the constitutional president of my country.”
Flores has also pleaded not guilty.
Both remain jailed at a detention center in Brooklyn, and neither has asked to be released on bail. Judge Alvin Hellerstein has yet to set a trial date, though that could happen at the hearing.
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In Venezuela’s capital, a couple hundred people, among them ruling party supporters, state employees and civilian militia members, gathered at a public plaza Thursday morning, planning to pray for Maduro and Flores and to watch the couple’s hearing, unaware that U.S. federal courts do not allow cameras.
A large screen mixed footage of Maduro, the Venezuelan flag and the country’s recent World Baseball Classic championship win.
“We are going to see him today,” ruling party leader Carmen Melendez told the crowd. “We may see him skinnier. … But that’s our president.”
A group of demonstrators held Venezuela flags and signs saying “Free President Maduro.” They also shouted “No boots on the ground, no bombs in the air. U.S. out of everywhere,” denouncing U.S. military actions abroad.
Some carried an inflatable doll depicting Maduro in orange clothing resembling prison garb.
Signs indicated some of the protesters were affiliated with the Workers World Party, which describes itself as a revolutionary socialist party.
The last time Maduro appeared at the courthouse, he was brought there in spectacular fashion.
A helicopter flew him from Brooklyn to a heliport in Manhattan, where a motorcade of law enforcement vehicles whisked him to the courthouse in just a few minutes.
The city’s multiple local and federal law enforcement agencies have made an art form out of transporting important people through streets that are often choked with traffic.
When Trump was on trial at a courthouse in the same Lower Manhattan neighborhood in 2024, police made sure his Secret Service motorcade also had an unobstructed and traffic-free path to the courthouse.
The judge presiding over Maduro’s case is 92 years old.
A native New Yorker, Alvin K. Hellerstein was nominated to the court by President Bill Clinton in 1998.
He’s not the oldest judge on the federal bench in New York. That honor belongs to Judge Louis L. Stanton, who is 98.
Hellerstein has handled many other big cases. For nearly 25 years, he has also presided over civil litigation resulting from the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on New York.
Legal issues surrounding the drug trafficking case against Maduro are expected to be complex, but they are unlikely to surface in a prolonged way at Thursday’s hearing.
The main subject of the court appearance involves how to pay his lawyers. Because of U.S. sanctions, the legal team can’t simply accept a check from Venezuela’s government. They need permission from the U.S. government. But U.S. authorities don’t want to grant it. They say Maduro can pay for his defense himself.
The dispute will get worked out in court.
Seating will be limited inside the courtroom where Maduro was to appear, and the line to get in started forming a day early.
Several professional line sitters in tiny tents were set up outside the court by Wednesday afternoon.
Some news organizations spent hundreds of dollars to pay people to hold spots for reporters who would arrive in the morning when the courthouse opened.
The indictment against Maduro accuses him of carrying out a wide-ranging conspiracy to traffic illegal drugs into the U.S. for more than a quarter century.
It says he cleared the way for thousands of tons of cocaine to enter the United States by teaming up at times with Venezuelan law enforcement to aid drug kingpins.
Maduro says he’s innocent. His supporters say that the U.S. military seized Maduro because U.S. President Donald Trump wanted regime change in Venezuela.
