TAMPA, Fla. (AP) — A federal judge in Tampa ordered the arrest of a former Green Beret accused of plotting to invade Venezuela in 2020 after he failed to appear in court for a hearing on whether he should be detained again for violating the conditions of his pretrial release.
Jordan Goudreau, 49, was arrested last year on weapons smuggling charges related to the failed coup attempt carried out during the first Trump administration.
He was released after a few weeks in prison when filmmaker Jen Gatien pledged her $2 million Manhattan apartment where the combat veteran lived as collateral for bail. In her testimony this week, Gatien detailed how the three-time Bronze Star winner became abusive, alleging that he threatened to hurt her and others and sent her text messages saying he would not go back to jail.
“I think he intends to leave this country one day,” Gatien said, noting that Goudreau previously lived on a sailboat in Mexico.
Judge Christopher Tuite issued an arrest warrant Friday after waiting 30 minutes for Goudreau to appear for the third day of his bond hearing. A probation officer said the ankle monitor Goudreau was required to wear was still located in the Tampa area, where Goudreau lived while receiving equine-assisted therapy supervised by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.
“I’m lost,” Goudreau’s lawyer, Marissel Descalzo, told the judge. “I haven’t talked to him about why he’s not here.”
Documentary about the raid in Venezuela
Gatien’s new documentary, “Men of War,” is a largely sympathetic look at Goudreau’s bungled plan to train a mercenary force of Venezuelan army deserters in neighboring Colombia to carry out a cross-border raid aimed at sparking a popular rebellion and ousting President Nicolás Maduro.
The plot, exposed by The Associated Press two days before the raid, never stood a chance against Maduro’s vastly superior security forces and ended with the deaths of several would-be freedom fighters and two of Goudreau’s U.S. Special Forces comrades locked up in a Venezuelan prison.
Since the film’s release last month, the relationship between the two has soured, and in the weeks leading up to the bail hearing, the filmmaker accused Goudreau in court documents of deception, financial coercion and threatening behavior.
Specifically, Gatien accused Goudreau of reneging on a promise — described by prosecutors as an “undisclosed side agreement” — to pledge his considerable reserves of cash, gold coins and cryptocurrency to mitigate the filmmaker’s financial risk as his sole bond guarantor.
He also shared with the court screenshots of angry text messages, sometimes incoherent and filled with profanity, in which he states, “I’m not going back to prison,” a statement prosecutors say indicates his intention to flee.
“They would have given me zero if I ran away,” Gatien testified. “All I got were broken promises over the past year.”
Search for assault rifles
Among those scheduled to testify at the hearing for the government was an Oklahoma couple who kept some of Goudreau’s belongings, including two assault rifles that an associate recently attempted to recover in possible violation of a court order against possessing firearms while on bond.
In a sworn statement, Brande and Jason Woolems explained that Goudreau had called them last month pressuring them to make false accusations against Gatien to prevent her from retracting the relationship.
The couple said in their affidavit that Goudreau asked them to sign statements accusing Gatien of misconduct.
“When we refused, he called us ‘Judas’ and accused us of treason, repeatedly shouting in anger,” they said in the statement.
Piglet Bay
The 2020 invasion, which became known as the Bay of Pigs, is a warning about the often amateurish way in which the Trump administration has sought regime change in Venezuela.
Those criticisms have grown stronger in recent weeks as a naval flotilla deployed by Trump carried out multiple deadly attacks on suspected drug smuggling ships leaving Venezuela and the president authorized the CIA to carry out covert actions inside the South American country.
Amid growing concern about a possible U.S. invasion, Goudreau has reemerged as a popular media pundit among both Trump supporters and critics of the “radical left.”
In recent interviews, Goudreau has at times lashed out at a number of alleged deep state actors (including the CIA and the State Department) whom he blames for “sabotaging” his clandestine mission, which he claims was blessed with a nod from the first Trump administration.
Many of those same actors are once again trying to derail Trump’s foreign policy agenda, he said. Meanwhile, he called Trump’s accusations that Maduro is the leader of the so-called Cartel of the Suns, made up of drug-trafficking military officers, as a “CIA fabrication.”
“If we invade Venezuela, what next?” he recently told Russian state-owned RT. “The truth of the matter is that the Venezuelan opposition is as ruthless and tyrannical as the Venezuelan regime of Nicolás Maduro.”
Plot aimed at overthrowing the president
Goudreau, who was born in Canada, said he became a believer in the cause of Venezuelan democracy after working security at a benefit concert held in Colombia to deliver humanitarian aid across the border.
Despite his lack of Spanish, he reached out to several exiled allies of opposition leader Juan Guaidó, whom the United States then recognized as Venezuela’s legitimate leader. For several months, a plan was devised to invade Venezuela with the aim of provoking a popular rebellion. As part of that effort, Goudreau signed a contract with Guaidó’s team, although the two sides parted ways months before the raid took place under new leadership possibly infiltrated by Maduro’s intelligence services.
Goudreau was set to stand trial in February on charges of failing to obtain an export license to ship approximately 60 AR-15 rifles to clandestine camps where aspiring freedom fighters were trained.
Two of the rifles seized in Colombia contain traces of Goudreau’s DNA, while suppressors, night vision goggles and other equipment had serial numbers matching those purchased by Goudreau and his Melbourne, Florida-based security company Silvercorp, according to prosecutors.
Gatien registered a production company in Florida with Goudreau in 2021 and was described in court records as his girlfriend. In testimony, Gatien denied being anything more than a good friend of Goudreau, who lived with her for two years while she attended the New York Film Academy.