Juan Carlos Marrufo Capozzi, an electrician and former soldier from Valencia, Venezuela, and his wife María Auxiliadora Delgado Tabosky, were at home when agents from the South American country’s military intelligence unit barged in. The couple was released in October and dropped off on a highway, only to be recaptured on the way home, and accused of terrorism and treason, amid a host of other offenses. News of their arrest appeared in the media, as often happens when people are detained on spurious charges in Venezuela.
A report released on Thursday by Amnesty International found that politically motivated arrests were often preceded by stigmatization and smear campaigns launched by pro-government media in Venezuela.
Hundreds of other people remain detained without trial in Venezuela, a country mired in social, political and economic ruin, and run by the authoritarian and isolated government of Nicolás Maduro. The UN working group on arbitrary detentions said in January that the couple’s detention was part of a “systemic practice of depriving people of their liberty without respect for the rights enshrined by international law,”, and that such a practice “could constitute crimes against humanity.”
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