U.S. Officer Sought To Convince Maduro's Pilot To Divert His Flight So He'd Be Taken By American Forces, Report Claims

A federal officer reportedly sought to convince the chief pilot of Venezuela's authoritarian President Nicolas Maduro to divert one of his flights to a place where he could be apprehended by U.S. forces, according to a new report.

The Associated Press detailed that agent Edwin Lopez offered the pilot, Gen. Bitner Villegas, a vast amount of money if he accepted. The pilot did give the agent his phone number, but did not commit to carry out the operation.

"I'm still waiting for your answer," Lopez told the pilot in August. He included a link noting that the Justice Department is offering $50 million to those who help with the apprehension of Maduro.

The agent , the report added, ended up retiring from his job without achieving success it, but continued chatting with the pilot through an encrypted messaging app.

The outlet noted that the plot began after a person showed up at the U.S. Embassy in the Dominican Republic in April 2024, during the Biden administration, claiming to have information about Maduro's planes.

Lopez, then an attaché at the embassy and agent for Homeland Security Investigations, was leading an investigation into transnational criminal networks in the region. The embassy job was set to be his last before retiring. Back then he received a tip claiming that two of Maduro's planes were undergoing repairs in the country.

After locating the planes, Lopez wondered whether he could persuade any of the pilots to give up Maduro. He got permission from superiors and questioned the different pilots individually at a hangar. Along with fellow officers, he pretended not to know what they did while speaking with them for an hour with each.

Intelligence had determined that Villegas was trusted by Maduro and tasked with flying him across the world, including to Iran, Cuba and Russia. Once he entered the room, he talked with Lopez about celebrities he had taken on the plane and his military service. However, the report noted, he began growing tense after 15 minutes, his legs shaking.

Villegas initially sought to dodge questions about whether he had flown Maduro, but ended up admitting so and showed him photos of them on his phone. He wasn't aware that the conversation was being recorded by another agent.

At the end of the chat, Lopez plainly offered Villegas money for delivering Maduro to a country where he could be apprehended by U.S. forces. The options included the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico or the U.S. military base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Villegas and the other pilots ended up returning to Venezuela without the planes, being told they didn't have proper clearances. However, in reality the U.S. government was crafting a federal forfeiture case to seize the planes, something that happened in September 2024 and February of this year. Maduro lashed out after the developments, calling the seizures "brazen theft."

Lopez continued talking to Villegas even after retiring, but the pilot ended up rejecting the plea. "We Venezuelans are cut from a different cloth," Villegas wrote in a message. "The last thing we are is traitors." Lopez then attempted to convince him by showing him a photo of them talking at the hangar plane and describing the future his three kids could have in the U.S.

After realizing he wouldn't be successful, Lopez sought to rattle Maduro by getting Marshall Billingslea, an ally of the Venezuelan opposition, to wish Villegas a happy birthday and include a cropped photo of the pilot at the hangar without Lopez. Speculation about Villegas' fate followed, but he was shown on TV in late September.

Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello dismissed any chances of the Venezuelan military being bought. He also praised Villegas, calling him an "unfailing, kick-ass patriot."