NEW YORK – The hearing scheduled for October 27 on the case followed in New York against former Honduran president Juan Orlando Hernández for drug trafficking has been postponed to November 15.
Judge Kevin Castel, of the New York Southern District Federal Court in Manhattan, presiding over the case, filed a document on Tuesday informing him of the date change to comply with covid protocols, but does not provide further details.
Hernández, who presided over Honduras from 2014 to 2022, was accused by the US government of cocaine trafficking and possession of heavy weapons, charges he pleaded not guilty to in a hearing in New York after being extradited last April for facing his trial.
The 53-year-old former president, detained in the Brooklyn County Federal Prison, is accused of three crimes committed between 2004 and 2022: conspiracy to import cocaine, possession of machine guns and heavy weapons and conspiracy to possess these weapons. for which he could be sentenced to life in prison if found guilty.
The trial is expected to begin on April 24, 2024.
His brother, former deputy Juan Antonio Hernández, is serving a life sentence in a US prison, sentenced by Judge Castel in March 2021 after having convicted him on charges also related to drug trafficking.