The Diplomat
The National Police arrested last night in Madrid the former Venezuelan general Hugo ‘el Pollo’ Carvajal, former head of Hugo Chávez’s Secret Services, who had been a fugitive from justice since 2019, and for whom the United States has requested his extradition.
According to the National Police, Carvajal lived “totally cloistered, without going outside or looking out of the window, and always protected by people he trusted”.
The former head of the Venezuelan secret services of the Hugo Chávez regime was internationally wanted by the United States for a drug trafficking offence and was initially arrested in 2019, but was released on parole. Upon learning that the Audiencia Nacional had decided to hand him over, he went on the run.
In March 2020, despite Carvajal’s whereabouts being unknown since November 2019, the Council of Ministers approved his surrender to the United States so that he could be tried for the alleged crimes of drug trafficking and arms trafficking. He had a warrant in force for his arrest and imprisonment for the execution of the extradition issued by the third section of the Audiencia Nacional.
The arrest was carried out at 21.15 hours on Thursday by the Fugitive Group II of the Central UDYCO, in a joint operation with the DEA, according to police sources, as reported to Europa Press.
The fugitive was hiding in Torrelaguna street in Madrid. The entry into the property where Hugo Armando Carvajal Barrios was hiding was carried out with judicial authorisation, with the collaboration of the Police Intervention Unit (UIP) to proceed with the warrant.
The police always suspected that he had remained in Spain after fleeing. In fact, in May this year, he issued a statement in which he complained about the attitude of the Spanish government. “Far from protecting me, the Spanish government and the Audiencia Nacional have committed serious irregularities against me,” he said.
The former head of Venezuela’s military counterintelligence directorate for eight years during the governments of Hugo Chávez and Nicolás Maduro is wanted by the US for acts that took place between 1999 and 2019, “when he allegedly belonged to the so-called Cartel of the Suns, dedicated to the transport of drug shipments”.
Some time after Nicolás Maduro came to power, he abandoned the Chavista cause and became a deputy for the opposition before fleeing to Spain, where he claimed he wanted to offer information to put pressure on the Bolivarian regime.
