Published at: 08/04/2026 09:00 PM

(LA EXTRA, April 6, 1963)

• Rómulo Betancourt showed his most disastrous mood on April 5, 1963, Palm Sunday, when officials of his political police massacred Ali José Paredes Yéspica, 22, an economics student at the Central University of Venezuela (UCV) and later unleashed the fierce persecution and kidnapping of the sisters of the murdered victim.
• Ali José was shot inside his house by sinister officials from the General Police Directorate (DIGEPOL) and the Armed Forces Intelligence Service (SIFA), when he demanded a search warrant from the criminal troop. In response, he was shot several times and then they proceeded to beat him with kicks and machine gun butts.
• This bloody spectacle took place in the presence of her mother, Trina Yéspica de Paredes, and her three sisters Elba, Carmen and Doris Paredes Yéspica.
• Not happy with it, and in full view of the public, they took him out to the street and left him sitting against a wall on the sidewalk, where he bled to death for four hours
• Around midnight, when the police thought he was dead, they took him to the Red Cross Hospital, where the medical staff, seeing that he was still alive, proceeded to operate on him as an emergency, giving him blood transfusions. However, he died in the operating room.
• Then, Ali José's executioners kidnapped his sisters Elba, Carmen and Doris, who were locked in the basements of DIGEPOL, located in the Las Brisas building in Los Chaguaramos.
• For several months, the Paredes Yéspica family was the victim of harassment, harassment and hostile actions by agents of DIGEPOL and SIFA.
• Among those identified as Ali José's killers were: Captain Carlos Vegas, Marcos Antonio Sabino Pérez, Fidias Sarmiento, José Izaguirre, “Mike” González, Régulo Martínez, Carlos Farrera, Ali Ruíz and Mario Segundo Leal.
• The above-mentioned were close friends and trusted agents of the then Minister of Internal Relations, Carlos Andrés Pérez, from whom they received direct instructions.
• The following day, given the press coverage of the horrendous act of blood, and by orders of the above-mentioned minister, the circulation of the Clarín newspaper was banned.
• The front-page headlines and the photo-cover of the victim's mother upset the minister so much that Clarín's offices, workshops and printing press were raided and the newspaper removed from circulation.
• Paredes Yéspica was a member of the Youth of the Communist Party of Venezuela (JPCV), being arrested three times before being brutally murdered
• He was born in Mérida on October 1, 1940, where he studied elementary school, then came to Caracas where he completed his high school studies. He was the son of Colonel (r) Antonio Paredes Pulgar and Trina Yéspica de Paredes.

Mazo News Team