The young political activist says he had been running an errand when a group of hooded men intercepted him, covered his face and beat him, accusing him of being a terrorist.
“They planted Molotov cocktails and petrol on me, and then took me to a detention centre,” he continued.
He was held in a prison in the interior of Venezuela for several weeks until he was transferred to Tocorón, a notorious high-security prison about 140km south-west of the capital, Caracas.
There he would go through what he describes as the worst experience of his life.
“When we arrived at Tocorón, they stripped us, beat us, and insulted us. We were forbidden to raise our heads and look at the guards; we had to lower our heads to the floor,” Juan recounts.
Juan was assigned a small cell measuring three metres by three metres, which he had to share with five other people.
There were six beds arranged in three bunk beds, and in one corner there was a septic tank and “a pipe that served as a shower”. That was the bathroom.
“In Tocorón I felt more like I was in a concentration camp than in a prison,” says the young man. He describes the beds as “concrete tombs” with a very thin mattress.
“They tortured us physically and psychologically. They wouldn’t let us sleep, they were always coming to ask us to get up and line up,” he explains.
“They would wake us up around 05:00 to line up behind the cell. The guards would ask us to show our passes and numbers.”
He adds that at around 06:00 they would turn on the water for six minutes so they could bathe.
“Six minutes for six people and just one shower, with very cold water. If you were the last one there and you didn’t have time to take off the soap, you were left covered in soap for the rest of the day,” he says.
Then, he adds, they waited for breakfast, which sometimes arrived at 06:00 and other times at 12:00.
Dinner was sometimes at 21:00, and sometimes at 02:00.
“Apart from waiting for meals, there was nothing else to do. We could only walk around inside the small cell and tell stories. We also talked about politics, but in low voices, because if the guards heard us, they would punish us.”
