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The regime of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo handed over political prisoner Mauricio Alonso dead on Monday, August 25, 2025. He had been detained on July 17, when he was captured along with his wife and son in the department of Carazo. The dictatorship also ordered his express burial in Jinotepe, under police guard.
Hooded men stormed Alonso’s home on the night of July 17, as part of raids carried out ahead of the July 19 anniversary. Alonso’s wife was released that same day, but he and his son remained in custody, denounced the Segovia Institute for Leadership and Social Transformation in Political Exile, in a statement.
From the day of his arrest, Alonso’s relatives searched for him in several prisons and hospitals in the country without obtaining any information about his whereabouts. It was not until Monday, August 25, 2025, that they received a call from the Institute of Legal Medicine informing them that the opponent’s body would be handed over.
Sources close to the deceased’s family confirmed the call from the Institute of Legal Medicine (IML). Afterwards, the widow and other relatives traveled to Managua to claim the body.
Alonso’s family declined to give interviews for fear of further reprisals, especially against his son, who remains in detention.
Regime Ordered Hasty Burial
Nicaraguan human rights defender and activist Haydée Castillo explained that Alonso’s relatives spent “all morning” at the IML (Institute of Legal Medicine), and it was only after 2:00 p.m. that the authorities handed over his body in a sealed coffin.
After releasing Alonso’s body, regime authorities ordered the family to bury him “immediately.”
National Police patrols escorted the minibus that transported Alonso’s body from the IML headquarters in Managua to the cemetery in Jinotepe, Carazo. They remained there until the funeral was over.
According to Castillo, the family was not given any document explaining the cause of death.
The U.S. State Department’s Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs condemned what happened to Alonso, declaring that it “will not tolerate such cruelty nor forget this crime” committed under state custody.
“Horrified by the inhumanity of the Murillo-Ortega dictatorship, the authorities today returned the lifeless body of Mauricio Alonso, a Nicaraguan defender of religious freedom, to his family. The dictatorship unjustly detained Alonso and kept him incommunicado for a month until his death,” the bureau stated.
Former President of the MRS
Mauricio Alonso was the last president of the Sandinista Renovation Movement (MRS, now UNAMOS) in the department of Carazo and a close friend of Pastor Rudy Palacios Vargas, who was detained on July 17 in the same department.
Prior to his detention, Alonso was harassed by police and kept under permanent surveillance by local political operatives, a source close to the family said.
“Police would ‘visit’ his house, as they do with others. He had to report himself, he was being controlled… he couldn’t leave the country,” the source emphasized.
“This is a crime against humanity that adds to the record of the United Nations Group of Experts investigating the regime’s crimes,” the Segovia Institute stated in its communiqué.
