Former Honduran President Hernandez released from prison after Trump’s pardon

TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras (AP) — Former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez, who was sentenced last year to 45 years in prison for his role in helping drug traffickers move hundreds of tons of cocaine into the United States, has been released from prison following a pardon from President Donald Trump, his wife announced Tuesday.

Read more: Honduran voters are voting in a close presidential race overshadowed by Trump’s surprise intervention

The US Bureau of Prisons’ inmate website showed that Hernandez was released from Hazelton US Penitentiary in West Virginia on Monday, and a spokesman for the bureau confirmed his release on Tuesday.

His wife, Ana Garcia, thanked Trump for pardoning Hernandez on the social media platform X early Tuesday.

“After nearly four years of pain, waiting, and difficult challenges, my husband, Juan Orlando Hernandez, is back to being a free man, thanks to a presidential pardon granted by President Donald Trump,” Garcia’s post said. She included a photo of Hernandez’s U.S. Bureau of Prisons roster indicating his release.

On Sunday, Trump was asked why he pardoned Hernandez by reporters traveling with him on Air Force One.

“Honduran has asked me, and many Honduran people have asked me,” Trump said.

“The people of Honduras thought he was being set up, and it was terrible,” he added.

“They basically said he was a drug dealer because he was the president of the country. They said it was a set-up by the Biden administration. I looked at the facts and agreed with them.”

Hernandez was arrested at the request of the United States in February 2022, weeks after the handover of power to current President Xiomara Castro.

Two years later, he was sentenced to 45 years in federal court in New York for taking bribes from drug traffickers so they could safely move about 400 tons of cocaine north through Honduras to the United States.

Hernandez maintained all along that he was innocent and a victim of retaliation from drug traffickers whom he helped extradite to the United States.

During his sentencing in New York, Federal Judge B. Kevin Castle said the punishment should serve as a warning to “well-educated, well-dressed” individuals who rise to power and believe their position insulates them from justice when they do wrong.

Hernandez has portrayed himself as a champion of the anti-drug trafficking movement, cooperating with US authorities under three US presidential administrations to curb drug imports.

But the judge said the trial evidence proved otherwise and that Hernandez used “great acting skills” to make it look like an anti-drug trafficking campaigner while deploying police and military forces to his country, when necessary, to protect the drug trade.

Hernandez does not guarantee a quick return to Honduras.

Immediately after Trump announced his intention to pardon Hernandez, Honduran Attorney General Joel Zelaya said on the X website that his office was obligated to seek justice and put an end to impunity.

He did not specify what charges Hernandez might face in Honduras. There were numerous corruption investigations into his administration during his two terms in office that did not lead to charges being brought against him. President Xiomara Castro, who ordered Hernandez’s arrest and extradition to the United States, is scheduled to remain in office until January.

The pardon promised by Trump days before Honduras’ presidential election injected a new element into the contest that some said helped his National Party’s candidate, Nasri Asfora, one of the leaders as vote counting continued on Tuesday.

Catalini reported from Trenton, New Jersey. Associated Press writer Alana Durkin Richer contributed from Washington, D.C