Federal agents of the United States arrested two Venezuelan pilots last Saturday who tried to leave for Venezuela in an executive plane from the international airport of Fort Lauderdale, Florida, With a shipment of guns and cash and checks according to the criminal complaint obtained by Univision Investiga.
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The arrested pilots Gregori Jerson Méndez Palacio, former aviator of the Venezuelan Air Force, and Luis Alberto Patiño Linares, They were in command of a Lear Jet executive aircraft with Venezuelan registration YV-3441 in which the agents found 82 weapons and ammunition, including 18 rifles, 58 pistols and six carbines.
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According to a source familiar with Venezuelan executive aviation, Méndez is a pilot close to a senior manager of a company that controls a subsidized food supermarket chain in Venezuela.
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The Venezuelan pilot Roswell Rosales, whom some commentators on social networks identified as the owner of the plane, clarified to Univision that he transferred the entire company that owns the aircraft in October 2019 to a person in Venezuela.
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According to Rosales, the transaction included the Lear Jet YV-3441. Rosales showed Univision documents reflecting the transaction.
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” I am neither the owner nor the operator of that aircraft since October 2019 “, said the pilot.
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Rosales explained that he was chief pilot of the Global Construction Fund of Venezuela from 2012 to 2016 and that said company was then owned by Colombian businessman Álvaro Pulido.
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According to the criminal indictment signed by National Security Special Agent Jared Rine, the events occurred as follows:
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At around 1:30 pm ET, Mendez and Patiño were about to take the Fort Lauderdale airport clearance runway when they received an order from Customs and Border Protection officials to take the aircraft to the Customs area. However, the pilots decided to park the plane on the ramp of an executive services company.
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Méndez went to the Customs area and, when the officials asked him where the plane was, he indicated that it was in front of the Jetscape executive services company. The agents immediately went to the ramp where they found Medina and several ground workers unloading boxes from the plane.
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Patiño said he did not speak English when questioned by agents. Upon inspecting the more than fifty boxes that officials had unloaded, they discovered weapons, ammunition and equipment. As part of the shipment, they found a .50-caliber Barret precision rifle.
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Meanwhile at the Customs offices, an agent asked the pilot Méndez how much money he had with him. He answered no more than $ 8,000. But when checking his backpack They found $ 18,000 and endorsed checks.
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At one point Patiño decided to collaborate with the agents and explained that Mendez, instead of obeying the orders of the agents to take the plane to Customs, directed it towards the Jetscape ramp and ordered him to unload it.
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Said they both wore three months staying in an apartment in Coral Spring, Florida, while acquiring weapons, ammunition, silencers and bulletproof vests with money from Méndez. The arsenal was loaded onto the plane on Friday, August 15, he added.
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Mendez, 40, is a former pilot in the Venezuelan Air Force. On his US-issued aviator’s license, he registered a hangar at the Fort Lauderdale airport as an address. In October 2017, he incorporated Enterprise International Inc. and Gregori Méndez Corp in Florida. In June 2020, he created Quantum Team Corp. and Liza Food.
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Patiño was presented Monday before a federal judge in the Southern District of Florida for a service of charges hearing where he was represented by a public defender. Both pilots are charged with smuggling of goods, illegal possession of weapons and smuggling of money.
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