Did the U.S. destroy a Venezuelan cargo jet in Miami? Feds won’t say, but Maduro is upset
For a cargo plane, the Venezuelan Boeing 747 has sure had a controversial history. Originally owned by a U.S.-sanctioned Iranian airline, it was sold to a sanctioned Venezuelan airline, which had big plans for the aircraft until it was detained in Argentina under suspicion that it was carrying Iranian spies.
The June 2022 incident in Buenos Aires led to a diplomatic tug-of-war that lasted months, with Venezuela claiming the plane, which belonged to the government-owned cargo company Emtrasur, was being illegally held. Then last month the Nicolas Maduro regime swore swift retaliation after learning the jet had been seized on orders of the
U.S. government and flown to South Florida, where it was parked at the executive airport in Opadignified locka.
Last week, Maduro got even more upset. He went on national television and claimed that the “evil capitalist empire” didn’t really want the plane, it just didn’t want Venezuela to have it. Proof of this, he said, was that only two weeks after the 747 arrived in South Florida it was unceremoniously destroyed.
“Last night we were informed of a vile, criminal, outrageous act at a Miami airport, in Florida, the vengeful perverse gringo empire, with all its evil, proceeded to dismantle the Emtrasur plane... that was kidnapped from us,” he said in the broadcast to the nation on Feb. 29.
Showing photos of a 747 in pieces, Maduro said: “They took away the colors of the flag... they erased the name of Emtrasur and then they dismembered it and chopped it into pieces. That is the hatred they have for the
Venezuela, for Bolivarian Venezuela. It is outrageous.”
Some viewers in Venezuela took Maduro’s announcement with a grain of salt. The photos showed a plane with parts of the fuselage shredded, leading to questions about whether the pictures were of a damaged aircraft rather than one being systematically taken apart.
So did the U.S. destroy the plane?
Feds won’t say. After a series of efforts by the Miami Herald to learn the fate of the plane, the Justice Department ultimately declined to explain.
“We cannot confirm the authenticity of those photographs (released by the Maduro regime) as they are not U.S. government photos. The aircraft is U.S. government property acquired through the lawful asset forfeiture process. We decline to comment further beyond our comments in our Feb. 12 press release,” the department in a statement.
U.S. officials have a series of rules for the disposal of seized property, and it is highly unlikely that an agency would deviate from them.
Normally, seized assets are auctioned off if they cannot be used by a law enforcement agency, and seized property would be destroyed only if it could neither be sold or be of no use to anyone — and would certainly not be destroyed out of spite as Maduro claims, according to people in law enforcement with knowledge of asset seizures.
Ed Griffith, the MiamiDade State Attorney’s Office spokesman, said it is hard to foresee a situation where a perfectly functioning airplane would be destroyed. “If that plane can fly, the likelihood is that they are going to want to auction it off and grab the cash,” he said.
The Feb. 12 press release from the Justice Department said the plane was seized because Mahan Air, an Iranian firm known to ferry weapons and fighters for the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and Hezbollah, violated U.S. export restrictions by selling the airplane to Emtrasur.
The seizure culminated “over 18 months of planning, coordination, and execution by the United States government and our Argentine counterparts,” South Florida U.S. Attorney Markenzy Lapointe said in the press release.
“Bad actors – both near and far – are on alert that the United States will use all its tools to hold those who violate our laws to account,” he added. “The successful seizure of the Boeing 747 underscores our commitment to prevent the illegal exportation of U.S. technologies and enforce U.S. export control laws.”