CARACAS – A man detained in Venezuela during the civil unrest that followed the country’s disputed July presidential election died in custody Monday, marking the third such death reported by an inmates’ rights organization.
The Venezuelan Prison Observatory nongovernmental organization said the 43-year-old man had spent more than four months at a detention facility. His death came as Venezuela's top prosecutor announced that roughly a fourth of the 2,000 people detained in connection with post-election demonstrations had been granted prison release orders.
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The inmates' rights group said the man was detained Aug. 1 along with his son. He was hospitalized with severe abdominal pain in December, which the organization said prison officials determined to be a “kidney colic.” However, his family “reported that medical attention was delayed and that they were not given precise information about the condition,” according to the group’s post on X.
The man’s son remains in custody.
Attorney General Tarek William Saab, in a statement posted on Instagram, said that a review of cases linked to the unrest resulted in 533 release “measures sought" by his office and "agreed” upon by the judicial system. It wasn't immediately clear how many of those orders had been executed.
He did not address the in-custody deaths.
President Nicolás Maduro ordered the review of cases amid increasing pressure from the international community for the repression campaign his government unleashed after the election, including the arrests of more than 2,000 adults and minors.
Venezuela’s governing party, which controls all aspects of government, tightened the crackdown on dissent after it and the opposition both claimed to have won the July 28 presidential election, prompting nationwide protests. At least 24 people were killed in the demonstrations, and a human rights watchdog has implicated state security forces in some of the deaths.
The United States, European Union and even some fellow leftist governments in Latin America have demanded that Venezuela’s National Electoral Council present detailed voting records, as it has in the past, to refute tally sheets presented by Maduro’s opponents showing their candidate, Edmundo González, prevailed by a two-to-one margin.
The U.S., EU and other nations recognized González as the election winner. But the former diplomat left Venezuela for exile in Spain in September after Saab’s office issued a warrant for his arrest in connection with the publishing online of the tally sheets.
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