A politician who was serving 45 years in prison after trafficking hundreds of tonnes of cocaine into the United States is now a free man.
Former Honduran president Juan Orlando Hernandez was released from prison following a pardon from President Donald Trump.
His wife Ana Garcia thanked Mr Trump for pardoning Mr Hernandez on X, writing: ‘After almost four years of pain, of waiting and difficult challenges, my husband Juan Orlando Hernandez returned to being a free man, thanks to the presidential pardon granted by President Donald Trump.’
Weeks after he left the presidency, he was arrested in February 2022 and sentenced to 45 years in prison in a New York federal courtroom for taking bribes from drug traffickers so they could safely move some 400 tons of cocaine north through Honduras to the United States.
Mr Hernandez maintained throughout that he was innocent and the victim of revenge by drug traffickers he had helped extradite to the United States.
Trump said he freed him because the people of Honduras ‘thought he was set up’, also placing blame on Biden.
‘They basically said he was a drug dealer because he was the president of the country. And they said it was a Biden administration set-up. And I looked at the facts, and I agreed with them,’ Trump told reporters.
Who else has Trump pardoned?
In January, Trump pardoned Ross Ulbricht, who operated a dark web drug market known as the Silk Road.
Ulbricht was convicted in 2015 and sentenced to life in prison for running the underground marketplace, which saw over $200 million of illicit trade conducted using bitcoins and other cryptocurrencies.
In a post on Truth Social, Trump announced he pardoned Ulbricht following a call with his mother, ‘in honour of her and the Libertarian Movement, which supported me so strongly’.
‘The scum that worked to convict him were some of the same lunatics who were involved in the modern-day weaponisation of government against me,’ he added. ‘He was given two life sentences, plus 40 years. Ridiculous.’
During his trial, Ulbricht was found guilty of money laundering, computer hacking and conspiracy to commit drug trafficking.
Pardons come amid tensions over drug trafficking in the Caribbean
Trump’s pardon of Hernandez for drug trafficking comes as he’s beefing up military presence in the Caribbean to stop drug traffickers.
Warships and coast guard vessels have been in the area since August, but the USS Gerald R Ford, the biggest aircraft carrier in the world, joined the fleet in early November.
‘President Trump is prepared to use every element of American power to stop drugs from flooding into our country and to bring those responsible to justice,’ a White House official told Reuters last week.
Operation Southern Spear, headed up by General Dan Caine, is attempting to stop the flow of drugs into America.
But stopping the flow of drugs could involve air strikes into Venezuela, which the Trump administration blames for the crisis.
US forces have carried out multiple fatal strikes targeting boats in Venezuelan waters following claims they are carrying drugs linked to gangs.
In September, a strike against a Venezuelan gang in the Caribbean left 11 people dead in international waters, prompting questions about the legality of the attack.
Sources told CNN that UK officials believe the September strike, and others, violate international law after having killed 76 people so far.
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