Venezuelan tycoon shields US fortune from FARC rebel victims

By JOSHUA GOODMAN
Associated Press

MIAMI (AP) — An appeals court has overturned a Florida federal judge’s order seizing the U.S. fortune of a sanctioned Venezuelan billionaire with alleged cartel ties to satisfy a $318 million judgment for the American victims of a Colombian terrorist kidnapping. Samark López is one of Venezuela’s most powerful businessmen and has been indicted in New York for allegedly violating sanctions that froze his sizable wealth in the U.S. The ruling Tuesday by the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected a 2020 order by Judge Robert Scola of Miami awarding those blocked assets to three former American defense contractors held for years by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia to satisfy an earlier judgment against the U.S.-designated terrorist group.