Family of 16-year-old teen imprisoned in Cuba makes urgent plea for his release

The family of a 16-year-old imprisoned in Cuba following an anti-government protest is pleading for his release, amid concerns about his health and the prospect of a lengthy prison sentence.

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“We still see him as a little boy,” Elier Muir, 58, an evangelical pastor, told Noticias Telemundo by telephone, describing the bag of candy and treats he brought to his son, Jonathan David Muir Burgos, two weeks ago. It is the first authorized visit to the maximum security Canaleta prison in central Cuba, where the teenager has been held since mid-March.

“We cannot accept seeing him grow up in prison and become an adult,” he said. “My son is neither a criminal, nor a delinquent nor a vandal, because they tried to discredit, defame and demoralize him.”

Jonathan Muir was arrested for participating in an anti-government protest in his hometown of Morón on the evening of March 13. The protest damaged a Communist Party office, with some protesters throwing stones at the building and throwing furniture into a bonfire amid freedom chants.

Elier Muir said authorities arrested his son days after the protest and charged him with sabotage. If the teenager is found guilty, he could remain imprisoned until the age of 30 or even 50, depending on the severity of the sentence handed down by the court, according to lawyers consulted by Noticias Telemundo.

Noticias Telemundo requested comment on the matter by phone and email from the Cuban government through its International Press Center, but did not receive a response.

Lawyer Eloy Viera, originally from Cuba, doesn’t believe the arrest is simply a scare tactic. He stressed that, unlike most countries, Cuba considers 16-year-olds to be adults under the law and can apply the full force of the law.

“If he was transferred to prison, it is because the prosecution decided to impose the preventive measure of pre-trial detention,” Viera said, adding that the protests in Morón “will not be something that the regime will let pass.” He noted that the city has seen the largest demonstrations of rebellion against the government since the unprecedented large-scale protests of July 2021, which resulted in numerous arrests and long prison sentences.

Jonathan Muir, a short teenager measuring 1.70 m tall and weighing 105 kilos, suffers from dyshidrosis, a chronic skin disease. According to his father, he had to take medication which he was unable to obtain in prison.

The teenager’s imprisonment attracted international attention; The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights urged Cuba to adopt the necessary measures to protect the “rights to life, personal integrity and health of adolescents, in connection with the right to freedom of expression.” Amnesty International cited the arrests in Morón, including those of “at least two teenagers,” as a backdrop to an “intensification of state repression.”

In the United States, Representatives Carlos Giménez and Maria Elvira Salazar, both Republicans from Florida, called for his release, with Salazar writing on X that “his only ‘crime’ was speaking out.” » Mike Hammer, US charge d’affaires in Cuba, told Elier Muir by telephone that the United States was concerned about his son’s case and would “see what we can do so that he can be released.”

In the aftermath of the protests in Morón, Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel said on X that he understood the anger over the power outages, but that “there will be no tolerance for vandalism and violence.”

The teen’s father claims the Cuban government is using his son as an “example” to discourage political dissent, while punishing him for operating an evangelical church, Tiempos de Cosecha (Harvest Times), inside his home without permission from the Communist Party.

Prisoners Defenders, a Madrid-based nongovernmental human rights organization, estimated in March that at least 1,092 people were behind bars in Cuba for criticizing the government and its leaders, including 33 minors. Activists and human rights groups estimate that dozens of them are still serving long sentences after the July 11, 2021 protests – the largest street demonstrations in the nearly 70 years of Castro’s revolution.

The Cuban government is under increasing pressure from the Trump administration, which has threatened to “take over Cuba” at any time if the government does not make substantial changes on economic and political issues, including releasing political prisoners.

In a recent interview with NBC’s “Meet the Press,” the Cuban president said the “narrative” that anyone who speaks out against the government is thrown in jail is a “big lie.” He also reiterated previous accusations by the Cuban government that opponents of the government are agents “financed by terrorist organizations” in the United States.

Jonathan Muir’s father points to the family’s humble home in Morón – with its rough, half-plastered walls – to refute Díaz-Canel’s claim that families like theirs, openly opposed to the regime, receive money from the United States.

“We are not employees, which is another characteristic that they want to use to denigrate and discredit us,” Muir said. If they received dollars from the “Yankee empire,” he added, his son would have medicine and food on the table, and his house would not be just a brick.

Jonathan’s sister, Dayana Muir Marrero, said her brother was not “a bad boy” as they want to portray him.

“If being a vandal means being tired of personal suffering, living with an illness where the necessary conditions for treatment are not available, and being tired of being silent and having the courage to shout ‘freedom,’ to ask for a little food, a little electricity; if being a vandal is that, then I would accept that he is a vandal,” she said.

Jonathan Muir’s father said he entrusts his son to what he calls “Christ’s lawyers.” He said his son had two court-appointed attorneys, giving him little confidence in a fair defense. “I hope Jonathan will be on the streets very soon,” Muir said. “Let’s hope there won’t be a trial. That’s what we ask God.”

Mario F. Lleonart, a Cuban pastor based in Miami, said he tried to get medical help for the teenager in the United States but said humanitarian parole was no longer in effect.

“We got him an appointment at a hospital in Washington and we had to reschedule it eight times while waiting for a humanitarian visa,” said Lleonart, coordinator of the Patmos Institute, a group that promotes religious freedom.

The teenager’s family said they wanted to preserve his physical safety but also his dignity. Jonathan, his father said, is a Christian teenager who spent his days playing piano at church services presided over by Muir. The family said they wanted the world to know that the teenager’s dream was to become a teacher of children with disabilities, but poverty and his poor health prevented him from going to school because it was too far away.

Determined to make something of himself, according to his family, Jonathan learned a trade and became a baker. His father said that when the young man learned to make his first Caribbean dish – the cornmeal and sugar fritter known as chivirico – he began contributing to household expenses.

Elier Muir said he will continue to tell his son’s story to anyone who will listen.

“Our son is skinny, he desperately needs us to get him out of there. He’s telling us, ‘I can’t take it anymore, I can’t take it anymore’… We feel his absence when we go to eat, pray, try to rest, because we don’t sleep,” Muir said.

He added that he would continue to speak about his son. “I don’t care,” Muir said. “Let them shoot me in the head or throw me in jail.”

An earlier version of this story was first published in Noticias Telemundo.