{"id":2713,"date":"2026-10-28T18:45:49","date_gmt":"2026-10-28T18:45:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/2026\/10\/28\/92-year-old-us-judge-handling-maduro-case-dies\/"},"modified":"2026-10-28T18:45:49","modified_gmt":"2026-10-28T18:45:49","slug":"92-year-old-us-judge-handling-maduro-case-dies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/2026\/10\/28\/92-year-old-us-judge-handling-maduro-case-dies\/","title":{"rendered":"92-year-old US judge handling Maduro case dies"},"content":{"rendered":"<div><img loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1024\" height=\"682\" src=\"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/92-year-old-US-judge-handling-Maduro-case-dies.jpg\" class=\"attachment-large size-large wp-post-image\" alt=\"92-year-old US judge handling Maduro case dies\" decoding=\"async\" srcset=\"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/92-year-old-US-judge-handling-Maduro-case-dies.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/cdn.vanguardngr.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Nicolas-Maduro-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/cdn.vanguardngr.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Nicolas-Maduro-768x512.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\"><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Alvin Hellerstein, the US judge overseeing the\u00a0case against deposed Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro, has died aged 92, an official confirmed Wednesday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">As one of the oldest US federal judges, questions had been raised about whether he was the right justice to preside over what could be a prolonged trial for Maduro on drug trafficking charges.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Hellerstein\u2019s lengthy career included overseeing the civil cases arising from Al-Qaeda\u2019s September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, often rejecting deals he saw as unfair to complainants.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">His death was confirmed to AFP by an official at the United States District Court, Southern District of New York, where he presided.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Hellerstein also tangled with Donald Trump, rejecting a request by the US president to have his New York hush money case moved to federal court.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Last year, he blocked the Trump administration from deporting alleged Venezuelan gang members without a court hearing.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In a noteworthy 2015 ruling, Hellerstein ordered the US government to release a trove of photos depicting abuse of detainees in Iraq and Afghanistan.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">He also presided over a trial last year in which a jury found French banking giant BNP Paribas\u2019s work in Sudan had helped prop up the regime of former ruler Omar al-Bashir, awarding $20.75 million in damages to three plaintiffs from Sudan.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Hellerstein handled the sprawling drug trafficking case linked to Maduro for over a decade, which has already seen the conviction of Venezuela\u2019s former intelligence chief, Hugo Armando Carvajal.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Maduro was seized by US forces in January in a military raid on his compound in Venezuela.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">A graduate of Columbia University law school, Hellerstein served as a lawyer in the US Army from 1957 to 1960 before entering private practice.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">He was nominated by then president Bill Clinton in 1998 to be a district court judge for the Southern District of New York.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">AFP<\/p>\n<p>The post <a href=\"https:\/\/www.vanguardngr.com\/2026\/10\/92-year-old-us-judge-handling-maduro-case-dies\/\">92-year-old US judge handling Maduro case dies<\/a> appeared first on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.vanguardngr.com\/\">Vanguard News<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>Source: <\/p>\n<div class=\"nSourse\">Vanguard News<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Alvin Hellerstein, the US judge overseeing the\u00a0case against deposed Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro, has died aged 92, an official confirmed Wednesday. As one of the oldest US federal judges, questions&hellip; <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2714,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2713","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2713","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2713"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2713\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2714"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2713"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2713"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2713"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}