Alvaro Pulido, 62, was taken into US custody after an investigation led by the Drug Enforcement Administration, the FBI and Homeland Security Investigations, American officials said on Sunday. The DEA and the US state department had offered a reward of up to US$10 million for information leading to his arrest. How Pulido ended up in US custody was not immediately clear.
Pulido was indicted in Miami federal court in 2019 and again in 2021 as part of an investigation into his longtime business partner, Alex Saab, a one-time ally of ousted Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro. Prosecutors allege the two men created a network of offshore shell companies to funnel bribes to top Maduro allies in exchange for more than US$2 billion in contracts to import food, medicine and low-cost housing during a period of widespread hardship in Venezuela.
"His alleged actions show a blatant disregard to the Venezuelan people by corrupting government programs intended to provide critical food, medicine, and housing for personal enrichment and exploiting the American financial system to do it," US attorney general Todd Blanche wrote in a social media post on Sunday. "No amount of time or distance will stop" the justice department "from working with our federal law enforcement and international partners to pursue these criminals and bring them to justice in an American courtroom," he wrote.
Prior to the alleged offenses, Pulido had a history of drug trafficking, including a 1997 conviction in Italy under the alias German Enrique Rubio, the US attorney's office for the southern district of Florida said.
The Colombian-born Pulido was arrested in Venezuela in 2023 as part of a corruption crackdown inside state-run oil company PDVSA. The crackdown was led by Delcy Rodríguez while she was serving as Maduro's vice-president. Rodríguez took over as Venezuela's acting president after the US military ousted Maduro in January.
Venezuelan authorities have so far been silent about the arrest, reflecting the challenge Rodríguez faces in appeasing elements of the ruling coalition that want her to resist attempts by the Trump administration to round up Venezuelan insiders wanted by the US, sometimes for years, on charges ranging from corruption to drug trafficking.
Saab, who also hails from Colombia, was deported to the US by Rodríguez in May. In September he pleaded guilty in a related bribery case, agreeing to cooperate against Maduro and other individuals and forfeit US$195 million in criminal proceeds.