{"id":508218,"date":"2026-05-20T21:33:59","date_gmt":"2026-05-21T01:33:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.net\/en\/uncategorized\/raul-castro-could-face-the-death-penalty-or-life-imprisonment-if-convicted-in-the-united-states\/"},"modified":"2026-05-20T21:33:59","modified_gmt":"2026-05-21T01:33:59","slug":"raul-castro-could-face-the-death-penalty-or-life-imprisonment-if-convicted-in-the-united-states","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/uncategorized\/raul-castro-could-face-the-death-penalty-or-life-imprisonment-if-convicted-in-the-united-states\/","title":{"rendered":"Ra\u00fal Castro could face the death penalty or life imprisonment if convicted in the United States"},"content":{"rendered":"The acting U.S. Attorney General, Todd Blanche<\/strong>, stated this Wednesday that he expects the Cuban ex-dictator<\/a> Ra\u00fal Castro<\/strong> to appear before the U.S. justice system “voluntarily or by any other means” after criminal charges were revealed against him for the downing of two small planes in 1996. Blanche made these statements at a press conference in Miami<\/strong> before an audience of Cuban Americans who responded with applause.\n\n\n

<\/a>Castro, 94 years old and younger brother of Fidel Castro, faces charges in the federal court of the Southern District of Florida for conspiracy to kill Americans, destruction of aircraft, and murder for allegedly ordering the downing of the aircraft on February 24, 1996. The incident claimed the lives of four Cuban-born men who worked with the organization Brothers to the Rescue<\/strong>, which assisted rafters trying to escape the island.<\/p>\n\n\nAs explained by Florida Senator Ashley Moody<\/strong> when reading the charges, the crime of conspiracy to kill Americans carries a maximum sentence of life in prison. Destruction of an aircraft adds up to five additional years, and each of the four murders carries “a maximum charge of death or life imprisonment”<\/strong>.\n\n\n

<\/a>The charges, formally presented in April although revealed this Wednesday by the Department of Justice (DOJ)<\/strong>, also include five other Cuban military personnel: Emilio Jos\u00e9 Palacio Blanco, Jos\u00e9 Fidel Gual Barzaga, Ra\u00fal Simanca C\u00e1rdenas, Luis Ra\u00fal Gonz\u00e1lez-Pardo Rodr\u00edguez and Lorenzo Alberto Perez-Perez, including the air force pilots who shot down the aircraft.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We recommend reading:Cuba calls US accusation against Ra\u00fal Castro a \u201cpolitical action\u201d<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

When asked if Washington is planning an operation in Cuba similar to the one that led to the capture of the then Venezuelan dictator Nicol\u00e1s Maduro<\/strong> on January 3, Blanche declined to answer directly. \u201cI am not going to compare cases\u201d<\/strong>, he said, and added: \u201cThe way we bring people accused of a crime varies\u201d<\/strong>. The prosecutor stressed that charging individuals who are not physically in US territory is not a new practice for his office.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/a>The downed planes were carrying Carlos Costa, Armando Alejandre, and Mario Manuel de la Pe\u00f1a, U.S. citizens, and Pablo Morales, a legal resident, all of Cuban origin. The\u00a0Cuban regime<\/strong>\u00a0claimed at the time that the aircraft were in its airspace and that the aviators were \u201cterrorists\u201d. The\u00a0International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO)<\/strong>\u00a0ruled, however, that the incident occurred in international waters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The First Secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba and former dictator Ra\u00fal Castro and Cuban dictator Miguel D\u00edaz-Canel observe the May Day demonstration in Havana, Cuba, on May 1, 2019. REUTERS\/Alexandre Meneghini<\/p>\n\n\nTrump called the accusation a “very important moment”<\/strong>, although he downplayed the possibility of military action against Cuba. “There will be no escalation. I don’t think it’s necessary. The place is falling apart. It’s a disaster and they’ve lost control somehow,” the president told the press. Secretary of State Marco Rubio<\/strong>, of Cuban-American origin, addressed a video message to the Cuban people in which he accused the leadership of Havana of theft, corruption and oppression, and conditioned USD 100 million in aid on the island taking steps towards a political opening.\n\nCuban dictator Miguel D\u00edaz-Canel<\/strong> rejected the accusation and stated that it lacks a \u201clegal basis\u201d. Through his X account, he maintained that the charges seek to \u201cadd to the file they fabricate to justify the madness of a military aggression against Cuba\u201d. D\u00edaz-Canel also linked the date of the announcement \u2014May 20, when the Cuban-American community commemorates Cuba’s independence from Spain\u2014 with what he described as a long history of US interference on the island.","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The acting U.S. Attorney General, Todd Blanche, stated this Wednesday that he expects the Cuban ex-dictator Ra\u00fal Castro to appear before the U.S. justice system “voluntarily or by any other means” after criminal charges were revealed against him for the downing of two small planes in 1996. Blanche made these statements at a press conference […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":133556,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_members_access_role":[],"_members_access_error":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-508218","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-uncategorized"],"acf":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/phj1q1-28d4","jetpack_featured_media_url":"","dum_api":{"author_name":"Yerandi Santana","author_image":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/cropped-WhatsApp-Image-2026-02-13-at-5.35.07-PM-96x96.jpeg","categories_name":["Uncategorized"],"featured_media_url":null},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/508218","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/133556"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=508218"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/508218\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=508218"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=508218"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=508218"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}