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Family says Cuban fighter Javier Ernesto Martín has been held six months with no charges filed
His partner, Lisandra Cuza, told Martí Noticias that the mixed martial arts champion, arrested on April 24 after nine days of live broadcasts from his balcony, still has no prosecution request and no trial date.
Mixed martial arts fighter Javier Ernesto Martín Gutiérrez, known as “Spiderman,” reached six months in detention on Saturday, October 24, without the authorities filing a prosecution request or setting a trial date, his partner, Lisandra Cuza, told Martí Noticias. “We are in the same place, we have no answer about his case,” she said.
Cuza warned about conditions at the maximum-security Combinado del Este prison, where he is held: according to her account, inmates have gone days without drinking water and short of food, and more than a week without phone contact with their families because of service failures.
Martín Gutiérrez, 34, a resident of the Havana municipality of Marianao, was arrested on April 24 after nine days of live broadcasts from the balcony of his home, in which he questioned the government's handling of prolonged blackouts, shortages of food and medicine, and the economic crisis. Plainclothes agents arrested him as he returned from training and he was first taken to the State Security headquarters at Villa Marista.
His family has filed four requests to change his precautionary measure so he can await trial outside prison, and all have been rejected. The legal aid group Cubalex published a report on the irregularities in the case, and the U.S. State Department commented on X after the arrest, noting that the athlete was detained for peacefully voicing, from his home, the hardships Cubans face on the island.
Sources: Martí Noticias · Serie Yamacoa: Presos políticos en Cuba (Prisoners Defenders)
Data updated: 2026-10-25T20:00:00.000Z