CBS’ Matt Gutman Recalls His 5-Day Detention at a Venezuelan Black Site While Maduro Regime Accused Him of Being a CIA Spy

Journalist Matt Gutman, who recently jumped from ABC News to CBS News, told Gayle King Monday about his time in Venezuelan custody in 2016, while reporting on the Maduro regime.

“We were basically in Venezuela to report on the kleptocracy there, on the corruption, focusing specifically on one hospital, this pediatric ward, because Maduro’s regime was stealing all of the medicine in the country. Literally leaving young children to die in their own hospitals,” Gutman began.

Gutman noted that Venezuelan journalists were not allowed to report on the kind of story he was pursuing.

He continued, “We were leaving, we were pointed out by some of the local militias, then the local police took us in, then the national police, finally the secret police. We were taken to a black site. I was there for five days. They accused me of being a CIA spy — obviously, that’s not true. They threatened that they would keep me there for years to come.”

Gutman said that although he was not physically mistreated, he saw people, “right there beside me for days…who were physically mistreated.”

“Obviously, the regime has tortured people and left people in unlawful detention for many years, and killed people, as well,” Gutman said. “And obviously, all of this relates to the charges here, and that terrible corruption that we’ve seen.”

Gutman added that he recently met up with a producer who was also held with him.

“He and I reunited for the first time yesterday, physically in the same space for the first time in nine years since we left each other and parted in that black site in Venezuela. So, a pretty incredible full circle here.”

Nicolas Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, appeared in a New York courtroom Monday to face charges of narco-trafficking. Both pleaded not guilty.

Watch the clip above via CBS News.