Missionary Tells Harrowing Tale of Prison Time He and His Wife Spent in Venezuela
‘It was as close to hell as you can imagine,’ said Josh, taking a deep breath. ‘We’re lucky to have made it out alive. When I first got there I was terrified and became very ill.
‘They threw me in a tiny cell barely big enough to fit a bunk bed in with no toilet. I had to crap on newspaper on the floor and pee in a bottle, the stench was unbearable.
‘In the first six months I dropped 60lb in weight, I had bronchitis, scabies, kidney stones and hemorrhoids and the only medical attention I was given was a shot of pain killers.
‘I was in constant pain in my stomach and one of my teeth split in two. I had agonizing tooth ache for three months and didn’t once see a dentist or receive medication.’
Despite the devastated economy in Venezuela, the textbook example of the many failures of a Marxist economy, American leftists still laud the “people’s revolution” in the socialist regime and continue to push the same ideology up North.
“Cognitive dissonance” doesn’t even come close.
And in true Marxist fashion, the Chavez-founded, Maduro-succeeded regime has hosted a slew of political prisoners subject to brutal conditions and even torture over the years.
See, because socialism is so great, you have to create a culture of fear, intimidation, and corruption just to maintain it!
Josh Holt is a 26-year-old Mormon missionary from Riverton, Utah, who was recently released from the notorious El Helicoide prison in Caracas where he was held on espionage charges.
Holt is not a spy, but just a regular American who met a beautiful Mormon girl, Thamy, online in 2016. They fell in love, as often happens in the new millennium, and Holt soon traveled to Venezuela where he proposed to and married Thamy. He remained in Venezuela with his new bride as they awaited Thamy’s visa.
That was when their nightmare began. Venezuelan police raided Thamy’s apartment, accused the duo of “weapons stockpiling”, and dragged them off to prison.
There, he was detained in squalor, defecating on newspaper and being subject to dehumanizing psychological torture like fake staged executions and torture.
Holt recently gave his account to Daily Mail:
‘It was as close to hell as you can imagine,’ said Josh, taking a deep breath. ‘We’re lucky to have made it out alive. When I first got there I was terrified and became very ill.
‘They threw me in a tiny cell barely big enough to fit a bunk bed in with no toilet. I had to crap on newspaper on the floor and pee in a bottle, the stench was unbearable.
‘In the first six months I dropped 60lb in weight, I had bronchitis, scabies, kidney stones and hemorrhoids and the only medical attention I was given was a shot of pain killers.
Advertisement - story continues below‘I was in constant pain in my stomach and one of my teeth split in two. I had agonizing tooth ache for three months and didn’t once see a dentist or receive medication.’
His wife, Thamy, was sickeningly subject to even more brutality, in the form of physical torture and constant interrogations. She gave her emotional account:
Tightly clasping Josh’s hand and breaking down in tears, Thamy recalled: ‘They covered my eyes, wrapped my arms in newspaper and electrocuted me with a taser, and they put the ends of my fingers in a pencil sharpener. I was so scared.
‘They wanted me to sign a confession that Josh was part of an espionage plot, that he led a CIA team sent to undermine the Venezuelan government, that he had killed people. I just cried and refused.’
This horrific story is not without an incredible ending. After two years in detainment, the couple, with the help of Trump administration senior officials, were finally released and escorted together to the airport, where they flew back home with Thamy’s two small daughters. They met with the President last week before being reunited with family.
Reunited. pic.twitter.com/Lb43PfEVXQ
— Senator Hatch Office (@senorrinhatch) May 26, 2018
The best part came upon their return to Utah, where friends and family were overjoyed to meet them and gave them a truly American welcome:
Two days later Holt landed back home in Salt Lake City, Utah, and was greeted by a large crowd of family and friends, some holding signs in English and Spanish saying ‘We never gave up’ and Let Freedom Ring’.
Holt’s grandmother, Malinda, draped an American flag around her grandson’s shoulders during the emotional homecoming as the crowd sang the national anthem.
For Holt, being back home on US soil surrounded by his family as a free man has still yet to sink in.
Let freedom ring, indeed.
