A federal judge in Miami handed down a 15-year prison sentence Wednesday to the former nurse of late Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez for taking bribes from a billionaire media mogul to green-light lucrative currency transactions when she served as Venezuela's national treasurer.
Claudia Diaz and her husband, Adrian Velasquez, were both found guilty in December by a jury of five of the six counts detailed in a 2020 indictment accusing them of taking millions of dollars in bribes. Velasquez also was sentenced Wednesday to 15 years.
