US announces criminal case against former Cuban President Raúl Castro

(20 May 2026)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:

ASSOCIATED PRESS
ARCHIVE: Santiago de Cuba, Cuba - 2 December 2000
1. Raúl and Fidel Castro together during military ceremony

ASSOCIATED PRESS
ARCHIVE: Havana, Cuba - 26 July 2004
2. Raúl next to Fidel preceding Cuban Parliament session

ASSOCIATED PRESS
ARCHIVE: Miami, U.S. - 25 February 1996
++4:3++
3. Various of surviving plane in hangar
4. Banner reading, "Brothers to the Rescue"
5. Map showing where planes were shot down
6. SOUNDBITE (English) Jose Basulto, founder of the Cuban exile group Brothers to the Rescue: "We're calling the Cuban people to rally behind us, and to face that government using civil disobedience, civic action and not responding to that government."

ASSOCIATED PRESS
ARCHIVE: Miami-Opa Locka Executive Airport, U.S. - 25 February 1996
7. Protesters yelling in protest against the shooting down of two planes belonging to an anti-Castro group by the Cuban Government
8. People standing outside gates to airport, sign reading, "Brothers to the Rescue"

ASSOCIATED PRESS
ARCHIVE: Miami-Opa Locka Executive Airport, Florida, U.S. - 24 February 1997
9. Mid of sign: 'Brothers to the Rescue' at airport
10. Various of young men with photographs of dead pilots
11. Pull out from close-up of memorial plaque to young men holding photographs
12. Backshot of people wearing T-shirts with 'Hermanos al rescate' (Brothers to the Rescue) imprint
13. Various of relatives crying
STORYLINE:
Federal prosecutors on Wednesday announced charges against former Cuban President Raúl Castro in the 1996 downing of civilian planes operated by Miami-based exiles as the Trump administration escalated pressure on the socialist government.

The indictment was related to Castro’s alleged role in the shootdown of two small planes operated by the exile group Brothers to the Rescue. Castro, now 94, was Cuba's defense minister at the time. The charges included murder and destruction of an airplane.

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and other top Justice Department officials made the announcement in Miami at a ceremony to honor those killed in the shootdown.

The investigation into Castro stretches back to the 1990s.

Starting in 1995, planes flown by members of Brothers to the Rescue, a group founded by Cuban exiles, buzzed over Havana dropping leaflets urging Cubans to rise up against the Castro government.

The Cubans protested to the U.S. government, warning that they would defend their airspace. Federal Aviation Administration officials also opened an investigation and met with the group’s leaders to urge them to ground the flights, according to declassified government records obtained by George Washington University’s National Security Archive.

“This latest overflight can only be seen as further taunting of the Cuban Government,” an FAA official wrote in an email to her superiors after one intrusion in January 1996. “Worst case scenario is that one of these days the Cubans will shoot down one of these planes.”

But those calls went unheeded and on Feb. 24, 1996, missiles fired by Russian-made MiG-29 fighter jets downed two unarmed civilian Cessna planes a short distance north of Havana just beyond Cuba’s airspace. All four men on board were killed.
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