Venezuela Prosecutor Franklin Nieves Says Opposition Leader’s Trial Was a Sham

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Supporters protest the jailing of opposition leader Leopoldo López in Caracas in September. PHOTO: CARLOS GARCIA RAWLINS/REUTERS

For more than a year, prosecutor Franklin Nieves argued before a federal judge in his native Venezuela that the country’s opposition leader, Leopoldo López, should be found guilty of inciting violence. In September the judge agreed, sentencing Mr. López to almost 14 years in prison in what most observers deemed a sham trial.

Now, Mr. Nieves, one of two lead prosecutors in the case, says he is sorry.

“Leopoldo López is innocent,” Mr. Nieves said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal, his first since fleeing Venezuela late last week and releasing a video saying the proceedings were bogus. His about-face is causing a political uproar in Caracas and a thorny problem for the embattled administration of President Nicolás Maduro, the heir to the late populist Hugo Chávez.

Dabbing at his eyes with a handkerchief, Mr. Nieves apologized for his actions as the prosecutor who detained Mr. López and jointly supervised his trial. “From my heart, I want to ask for forgiveness from Venezuela, Leopoldo López’s, López’s wife, the López family, and especially from their children,” he said.

After claiming they were heading for a vacation in Aruba, Mr. Nieves brought his wife and two daughters with him to Miami, where the family is seeking asylum in the U.S.

The president has become increasingly unpopular in the wake of declining oil prices and economic mismanagement that have caused a deep economic contraction, widespread shortages, and the world’s highest inflation.The prosecutor’s dramatic defection and apology are likely to deepen the country’s political crisis and provide more ammunition to critics of Mr. Maduro’s government ahead of upcoming mid-term elections in December. The ruling United Socialist Party of Venezuela is lagging in polls and widely expected to lose control of the legislature.

Mr. Nieves’ change of heart offered confirmation for what the country’s opposition and international observers believed from the day Mr. López surrendered to police in February of last year: that his arrest was a political move by Mr. Maduro’s government as part of a broad bid to tamp down dissent, just as nationwide anti-government protests were kicking off.

“This was a totally political trial which should be nullified. All of Leopoldo López’s human rights were violated because he was not able to present any witnesses or evidence,” Mr. Nieves said in the interview.

In the wake of the revelations, Mr. Lopez’s family members and opposition leaders have demanded freedom for the 44-year-old leader of the Popular Will party, who is currently serving his sentence in a military prison.

“This is very important because it shows that Leopoldo Lopez is a political prisoner and that the regime is jailing its political opponents,” said Eric Farnsworth, vice president of the Washington-based Council of the Americas.

if anyone dissents from carrying out an order, he will be detained, or a criminal case will be invented against him and he will be jailed,” Mr. Nieves said. He said dozens of Venezuelan security officials milled around outside the courtroom doors during every one of Mr. López’s trial sessions, serving to intimidate judicial personnel into not defying orders.

Mr. Nieves said judges and prosecutors were pressured to convict political opponents of the regime by their superiors, who would give them their orders verbally in frequent meetings.

In Caracas, Venezuela’s Attorney General Luisa Ortega denied that Mr. Nieves was pressured and said the prosecutor was fired in recent days “because he abandoned his position.”

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Prosecutor Franklin Nieves now says the trial was politically motivated and unfair. PHOTO:JOSE DECORDOBA/THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

In a televised interview, Ms. Ortega accused Mr. Nieves of acting in an “antinational” manner.

“He ceded to the pressures of foreign factors and sectors of the country, not the Attorney General’s Office,” she said. “The prosecutor’s office doesn’t pressure anyone.”

Mr. López was convicted of inciting violence based on a speech he gave at demonstration in February 2014, a time when much of Venezuela was riven by protests, some of which turned violent. At least 43 people died before protests petered out later that year. Most of those were killed by Venezuelan security forces and armed groups allied with the government, say Venezuelan and foreign human rights groups that collected testimony from victims’ families.

Human rights groups and people in attendance at Mr. López’s trial said his defense was barred from presenting nearly all of the evidence in its favor, while the prosecution—including Mr. Nieves—had free range to argue how the opposition leader incited violence by sending subliminal messages through social media platforms like Twitter.

“It reminded you of everything from Kafka to Oscar Wilde to the case against Socrates,” said Diana López, Mr. López sister, who attended most of the trial sessions. “It was repugnant because it was all false.”