La Patilla’s journalist, Rory Branker, who was forcibly disappeared by Venezuela’ political police for more than 48 hours this Saturday, after two armed individuals took him away after allegedly threatening to send him to Maduro’s infamous torture center “El Helicoide”, the headquarters in Caracas of the Bolivarian National Intelligence Service (Sebin).
lapatilla.com
According to sources close to the case, last Thursday, February 20th, “Rory left his house in Terrazas de El Ávila around 4:00 P.M. and was intercepted by two individuals on a motorcycle, armed and dressed in civilian clothes”.
At that moment “they stopped him, asked him if he was Rory Branker and put him in the back seat of his car. One of the individuals drove his car and another left on the motorcycle. Rory and his partner were in the back seat”.
Then they were taken “to another place in Boleíta where they changed Rory into another unmarked car and told him that he was being taken to the Sebin.” The unknown individuals threatened his partner and threatened that Rory’s physical integrity “depends on whether this was made public or not”.
Since then, his partner lost all contact with Rory and his whereabouts remain unkown.
The unknown individuals carried out a raid and search without any warrant at Rory’s residence, where they forced his partner to collaborate while they confiscated three computers and two phones. They also tried to take some personal items but his partner managed to prevent it.
Earlier that day two persons had been asking questions about him in his residential complex, but they did not find him.
When they left Rory’s house, the kidnappers told his partner that they had taken him to El Helicoide. However, beyond those words, there is still no reliable information about where he is being held.
The car he was driving when he was intercepted also disappeared.
Rory lived with his partner and his mother, an elderly woman who suffers from hypertension and also suffered a stroke last year.