A Santiago court sentenced Maickel David Villegas Rodríguez to 20 years in the kidnapping and death of Ronald Ojeda.

Twenty years is the term imposed Thursday. Judge Gloria Canales said the court would have applied life imprisonment, and that Chile's extradition treaty with Costa Rica barred a life or death sentence for a person handed over from that country and capped this penalty at 20 years. What the judges found proved was participation: logistical support, earlier surveillance, and help getting the direct perpetrators away. Cooperativa reported the prosecution's theory of a direct Venezuelan-government role was not proved in this trial.

Cooperativa reported that on Thursday, Oct. 15, 2026, the Segundo Tribunal de Juicio Oral en lo Penal de Santiago sentenced Maickel David Villegas Rodríguez to 20 years of presidio mayor en su grado máximo for his part in the February 2024 kidnapping and homicide of Ronald Ojeda, a Venezuelan dissident and former lieutenant. La Tercera reported the court entered the conviction in his capacity as author of the kidnapping-with-homicide offense. Cooperativa reported he is the first person convicted at an oral trial in the case. The Associated Press described him as a Venezuelan gang member extradited from Costa Rica. ADN Radio reported he is 28. The 20-year term is what this court imposed. It can still be appealed.

Ojeda was taken from his apartment in Independencia and later found dead in a camp in Maipú, Cooperativa reported. Cooperativa reported the court found that Villegas gave logistical support, collected information beforehand, and assisted the flight of the people who carried out the kidnapping. BioBioChile reported the proved conduct included surveillance during the kidnapping, and that Alejandra Valdivieso, a lawyer for Ojeda's family, described his role as strategic. La Tercera reported the legal label on the judgment was authorship of the kidnapping-with-homicide offense. The conduct those outlets describe is the participation the 20-year term rests on.

Judge Gloria Canales said, as she read the sentence, that the court had been prepared to impose life imprisonment, Cooperativa reported. The extradition from Costa Rica blocked that. Cooperativa reported the treaty between Chile and Costa Rica bars life imprisonment, qualified life imprisonment, and the death penalty for people surrendered in extradition, and that the ceiling here was the 20 years imposed. La Tercera reported the panel, with Canales drafting the ruling, said the statute assigns a life term to this offense and that the extradition commitment made life unavailable, so the court used the next fixed term and set it at the maximum. Prosecutor Álex Cortez told BioBioChile that 20 years was what his office could request because of the Costa Rica commitments, and that the court granted it.

The defense said it would evaluate an appeal. Cooperativa reported that Villegas's lawyers, leaving the Justice Center, said they would consider filings in the higher courts within the formal deadlines. BioBioChile reported defense lawyer María José Opazo said the defense would file a nullity petition within the legal period. Cortez told BioBioChile the sentence is not yet final, so Villegas remains for now where he has been held before trial.

Cooperativa reported that this first ordinary trial did not find proved a direct role by the Venezuelan government, the thesis the prosecution has advanced, and that the political-motive question sits in a separate investigative file. BioBioChile reported Cortez said the next oral trial will not try that motive. Cooperativa reported that trial opens Oct. 20 against about 20 other defendants prosecutors link to Los Piratas de Aragua, with differing degrees of alleged responsibility in the homicide. The Associated Press described Villegas in the setting of a Tren de Aragua case. That is the wire service's framing of who he is. The political-motive theory is a separate question, and this court did not find it proved. All defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.