Five years after 12F: The Youth Day when Maduro's Snipers Executed Nonviolent Youth and Kept Doing It

"Gentlemen, he who is here will go out tomorrow to find a better future." - Bassil Alejandro Dacosta, age 24 , over Facebook on February 11, 2014. He was murdered the next day by the Maduro regime.

Robert Redman with other youths carrying Bassil Dacosta on February 12, 2014.

Five years ago nonviolent student protesters Bassil Da Costa and Robert Redman were gunned down on February 12, 2014 in Venezuela, while engaged in nonviolent street protests against the government of Nicolas Maduro. Robert Redman was shot and killed hours after he had carried Bassil, who had also been shot and died earlier that same day, and tweeted about it.

"Today I was hit with a rock in the back, a helmet in my nose. I swallowed tear-gas, carried the kid who died, and what did you do?" - Robert Redman, age 28 over twitter on February 12, 2014 

On February 12, 2014 Venezuela's National Youth Day millions of young students took to the streets to nonviolently protest "the social and economic crisis caused by the illegitimate government that Venezuela has today."  

Young Venezuelans inside and outside of the country mobilized in a coherent and sustained effort to expose the anti-democratic nature of the Maduro regime. A full and brief explanation was offered by Andreina Nash at the time in the video titled: What's going on in Venezuela in a nutshell.

The regime violence had escalated in the days prior to February 12th. On February 11, 2014 in an update via twitter from Roderick Navarro and Guido Mercado they reported, "wounded by bullets today: Jorge Monsalve 20 years old, Franco Perez 15 years old (Thorax), Pedro Alison 24 years old (Left arm), Anny Paredes 36 years old (Abdomen)."  On the days following February 12th the regime orchestrated violence and killings continued.

Robert Redman and Bassil Alejandro Dacosta murdered five years ago.

On May 18, 2017 The Miami Herald reported that it had a secret recording of a Venezuelan general advocating for the use of snipers against street demonstrators "in the future." The sad news is that this has been a practice long adopted by the Maduro regime in Venezuela.

Genesis Carmona is evacuated on a motorcycle after being shot.

Génesis Carmona, a local beauty queen, was just 22 years old and nonviolently expressing her desire for a better Venezuela when she was shot in the head on February 18, 2014 and died a day later. 

Génesis was marching at approximately 4:00 pm on Tuesday February 18, 2014, near Cedeño Avenue and the intersection of Carabobo, when  a group of masked gunmen on motorcycles opened fire on the demonstrators. She was shot in the head in the left occipital region. Génesis was with her sister Alejandra Carmona at the moment it happened. Alejandra in a radio interview said "I was with her, when the motorized units (of the Government) arrived, we fled running. We were stopped on a street corner, we were looking up and then suddenly she fell."   

According to VOXXI the "22-year-old was rushed in a motorcycle to the Medical Center Guerra Mendez in Valencia, where she was operated and kept in intensive care. Less than 24 hours later on 12:14 p.m., the doctors announced that she had died from her injury. 

Five years will have passed in five days and those responsible for her murder have yet to be brought to justice, and the extrajudicial killings continue in Venezuela.

Génesis Carmona: Shot in the head by a sniper on February 18, 2014

Geraldine Moreno was shot in the head with buckshot on February 19, 2014 in Tazajal, located in Naguanagua, in the state of Carabobo while taking part in a protest and in one of her last tweets on February 17th explained what motivated her to take part in the demonstrations: "No one sends me I go because I want to defend my Venezuela." She died from her injuries on Saturday, February 22, 2014. She was 23 years old.

Geraldine Moreno (age 23) shot in the head with buckshot and died

 In the evening hours of March 18, 2014 Anthony Rojas died of a gunshot wound to the face. He was a second semester student of mechanical engineering at the University of Tachira (UNET). He died in a presumed shootout near a shop in the Diamante sector of Táriba. It was learned that Rojas was in the commercial establishment buying drinks with other youth when motorized units passed by fired and into the place. He was eighteen years old. 

Anthony Rojas shot in the face and killed 3/18/14

On February 12, 2019 hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans took to the streets to protest against the Maduro regime, to demand a democratic restoration, and remember those killed by the dictatorship. The theme for the mobilization of the student movement on February 12th was "The Youth Do Not Forget" and the mass nonviolent movement took to the streets.

Regime tactics have grown more deadly over the past five years.  In 2017 Nicolas Maduro ordered the formation of the FAES - "the Spanish acronym for the Bolivarian National Police’s Special Action Forces," according to Caracas Chronicles " are police Death Squads in all but name."

Maikel Jesús Cumare Ávila (age 21) murdered by Maduro's death squad on 1/8/19

Maikel Jesús Cumare Ávila was 21 years old when he was murdered by FAES officers in front of his mother, Desiré Cúmare, on January 8, 2019. At 9:00 a.m., his mom heard a knock on the door. In a flash, masked men had a gun to her face. They threatened to shoot her if she didn’t open the metal door. According to his mom, "Maikel took the keys and opened himself. They burst in, pushed him to the ground and started kicking his head against the floor. That’s how they killed him. They cracked his skull.”

The Chavez-Maduro regime was in its 20th year, before the arrival of the new and legitimate government of President Juan Guaido. Although now illegitimate and a tyranny, Maduro's regime, still continues to carry out extrajudicial killings and attempt to block humanitarian aide for Venezuelans.  

According to Amnesty International there have been more than 8,200 extrajudicial executions between 2015 and June 2017 in Venezuela.

Two question arise in the midst of the continuing repression: How many Venezuelans have been murdered by the Chavez-Maduro regime between 1999 and 2019?  and "When will this regime that sends out death squads to murders students and artists finally stop?"