Perkins Rocha was charged with five crimes, including terrorism
Lawyer Perkins Rocha, legal adviser to Venezuela’s main opposition alliance – the Democratic Unitary Platform (PUD) – was arrested on Tuesday and charged with five crimes, including “terrorism,” his wife, María Costanza Cipriani, said Thursday. She explained that he was brought to court without being able to exercise “his right to private defense.”
The lawyer, one of the main collaborators of opposition leaders Edmundo González Urrutia and María Corina Machado, was also charged with “treason, conspiracy, criminal association and incitement to hatred,” Cipriani said in X. He explained that he was “presented in a hearing with the assistance of a public defender” and that he was denied “his right to private defense.”
He said he is being held at the headquarters of the Bolivarian Intelligence Service (Sebin), known as El Helicoide, in Caracas, where he said he “is kept isolated from his family and lawyer.”
This morning at 3 am I was informed by text message that my husband @perkinsrocha He had been presented at a hearing with the assistance of a public defender, and was denied his right to private defense.
He has been charged with 5 charges:
Terrorism, Treason, Conspiracy,— Looking for Citizens (@MaCostanzaCR) August 29, 2024
“My husband is in prison for dissenting, for expressing his opinion and for fighting for the truth to be known, for wanting a country where we all fit in and where we can live according to our efforts,” Cipriani added.
Liberation of Rocha
The PUD demands the release of its legal advisor and the rest of the “political prisoners,” as well as the cessation of “the persecution” that – it warned – has “worsened” after the presidential elections of July 28, in which President Nicolás Maduro was proclaimed the winner by the electoral body, and endorsed by the Supreme Court, a result described as “fraudulent” by the majority opposition, which defends the “victory” that – it claims – González Urrutia obtained.
According to official figures, more than 2,400 citizens have been arrested since July 29 – some in demonstrations and others in police operations – and 25 have been killed in acts of violence that the government attributes to the opposition, while anti-Chavez supporters blame the state security forces, on orders from their superiors.
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