Over the weekend, Marggie Orozco, a small-town doctor beloved by her community, was sentenced to 30 years in prison.
In the United States, to receive a sentence of up to 25 years to life in prison, you must typically commit a Class A or Class B felony. Class B felonies include assault with a deadly weapon, kidnapping, negligent or voluntary manslaughter, and grand larceny in the first degree. Class A felonies include first-degree murder, aggravated sexual abuse, large-scale drug trafficking, and acts of terrorism.
So, you're probably thinking that this 65-year-old grandmother must have dome something really bad to warrant that kind of punishment, right? Wrong. The problem is that she doesn't live in the United States. She lives in Venezuela.
She wasn't trafficking kilos of fentanyl or robbing a bank, and she didn't kill anyone. On July 28, 2024 — the day Venezuelans went to the polls to vote for a new president — Orozco simply recorded a private voice message in a WhatsApp group to share with her neighbors, urging them to go vote against Nicolás Maduro that day.
Of course, we all know by now that, despite ridiculous amounts of evidence, Edmundo González actually won the election by a solid majority, but even so, Maduro declared himself the winner. People took to the streets to protest, but Maduro's regime put a stop to it through threats, force, and intimidation. That included disappearing or locking up dissenters for merely having an opinion. People like Dr. Orozco.
On August 5, 2024, a CLAP leader in her community in the state of Táchira reportedly heard the private message she recorded and filed a complaint, and by that night she'd been arrested during a raid in her own home. In September, her health began to decline and she had a heart attack. She spent one night in the hospital and was returned to jail.
According to her husband, she'd suffered from heart problems since 2013 — she has had one other heart attack before — and confinement was making it worse. Even so, on December 6, 2024, she was transferred to the women's annex of the Western Penitentiary Center in the southern part of Táchira to await trial.
On Friday, she finally had her day in a Venezuelan kangaroo court, and Maduro loyalist Judge Luz Dary Moreno sentenced her to 30 years for "treason," "conspiracy," and "incitement to hatred." Sources say her defense team was not even allowed to speak. Other doctors in her community have called for her release.
César Pérez Vivas, an anti-Maduro activist and former governor of Táchira, posted a picture of Orozco on X and confirmed the information.
"Dr. Marggie Orozco (65 years old) was sentenced to 30 years in prison. Denounced by a CLAP leader from her community in San Juan de Colón for a simple WhatsApp audio about the elections of July 28. The sentence, issued by Judge Luz Dary Moreno, is a perverse act against a person with serious health problems. Defending freedom of expression is not a crime," his caption reads (translated from Spanish).
La Dra. Marggie Orozco (65 años) fué condenada a 30 años de prisión. Denunciada por una jefa del CLAP de su comunidad en San Juan de Colón por un simple audio de WhatsApp sobre las elecciones del 28 de julio.
— César Pérez Vivas (@CesarPerezVivas) November 16, 2025
La sentencia, dictada por la juez Luz Dary Moreno, es un acto perverso… pic.twitter.com/TttP0YCA5K
Orozco's story is sad, but what makes it even worse is that it's the rule, not the exception. Since the post-election protests, Maduro's regime has locked up or disappeared thousands of people for merely having an opinion. The country is a surveillance state, where the government spies on you and encourages your fellow citizens to do the same and report you if you're anti-regime. In some cases, your voting records are even tied to whether or not you can get food, medicine, or your pension via a mobile app.
For what it's worth, CLAP is the acronym for Los Comités Locales de Abastecimiento y Producción, the Venezuelan government's food subsidy program that doubles as a way to keep tabs on people. It distributes food and monitors your thoughts. That's how Orozco got caught.
This is what toying with socialism eventually gets you.
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