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SAO PAULO (AP) — Chile will formally request that the United States extradite a Venezuelan man to stand trial over the abduction and killing of a Venezuelan ex-army officer and dissident last year in Chile, prosecutors said Thursday.
It's the latest twist in a closely watched case that sent chills through Venezuela's vast diaspora.
Chile alleges that the disappearance and gruesome killing of the former lieutenant, Ronald Ojeda, 32, was carried out by the Venezuelan criminal group Tren de Aragua, which U.S. President Donald Trump recently designated as a terrorist organization.
Officials say they will seek to have the suspect, identified as Edgar Benítez, sent back to Chile's capital of Santiago, where the crime took place just over a year ago. Chilean authorities discovered Ojeda’s dead body packed inside a suitcase, encased in concrete and covered in quicklime to speed up its decomposition after the dissident's disappearance on Feb. 21 last year.
With 24 people arrested across three countries so far, the case has exposed how one of Latin America's most notorious gangs has extended its tentacles all over the continent, taking advantage of Venezuelan refugees who have fled their country’s economic collapse and political repression.
Thursday's announcement marked the latest of several extradition requests from Chile to other countries in recent months as security forces across the continent nab members of the Tren de Aragua gang wanted for their alleged involvement in Ojeda's killing.
Chile has been holding hearings to charge 19 people now in custody inside the country. Another three people have been arrested in Colombia and two in the U.S., now including Benítez.
In Chile, Benítez was charged in absentia for kidnapping, homicide, receiving stolen property and criminal association. On Feb. 12, he was arrested in South Bend, Indiana. Once the U.S. gets the request, the extradition process moves to American courts. It could take months.
Benítez has not commented publicly on the accusations against him.
The case took on a more serious resonance earlier this year as Chilean prosecutors accused the highest rungs of leftist President Nicolás Maduro’s government in Venezuela government of ordering Ojeda's killing.
Chile's attorney general said a protected witness had singled out Maduro’s powerful interior minister, Diosdado Cabello, in testifying to investigators about the plot.
Venezuelan authorities have denied the allegations, which sharpened diplomatic hostility between the countries.
If true, experts say, the case would mark a dark escalation in Maduro's efforts to crush dissent to his authoritarian rule.
