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The Municipal Prosecutor's Office of Trinidad, in the province of Sancti Spíritus, has opened an investigation against three state entities for six alleged crimes of fuel theft and other material goods, reported this Sunday by the official newspaper Escambray.
According to the chief prosecutor of the territory, Marlines Hernández Mollineda, what worsens the case is that all the affected facilities had active surveillance and protection systems at the time of the incidents.
"What stands out to us the most is that in these places there was a system of surveillance and protection for the care of these assets, and due to weaknesses in the control, these events occurred which represent an undeniable and substantial loss for the State," stated the official.
The process involves several citizens directly responsible for the custody of the stolen resources. The authorities have already recovered some of the assets within the very facilities being investigated, although they are still awaiting the technical assessments.
"Investigations are ongoing, and we are awaiting the expert assessments, although stolen goods have already been seized from the premises," Hernandez specified.
From a legal standpoint, fuel theft is treated with particular severity in Cuba. The prosecutor explained that this crime is not prosecuted as an ordinary theft, but is classified as sabotage, with penalties ranging from three to eight years of imprisonment, which are higher than those for theft with force—between two and five years—or for failure to protect property—between six months and two years.
"In the current circumstances, the rigor of the investigations is greater due to the damage caused to the country's economy by the theft of resources," emphasized the chief prosecutor.
The case of Trinidad fits into a national pattern of fuel diversion from the state sector, exacerbated by the worst energy crisis Cuba has faced in decades.
On May 14, the Minister of Energy and Mines, Vicente de la O Levy, publicly admitted that the country had depleted all its reserves: "We have absolutely no fuel oil, nor absolutely no diesel."
This extreme scarcity has driven the price of diesel in the informal market up to between 3,500 and 8,000 pesos per liter, turning the diversion of state fuel into a highly lucrative business and increasing thefts at state facilities.
Cases have been reported across the Island in recent weeks. At the beginning of June, MININT forces detained in the also-Spirits municipality of Yaguajay a tanker truck with 6,000 liters of stolen fuel oil from oil wells in Ciego de Ávila, which led to an investigation for possible sabotage with four defendants held in provisional custody.
At the end of that month, a man was arrested in Guantánamo while transporting 120 liters of diesel in an electric tricycle, and authorities also found multiple containers of fuel stored inside a generator.
The state-owned company Cupet has acknowledged that workers, custodians, brigade leaders, and executives from the affected entities are involved in these crimes, which indicates that the problem is not circumstantial but structural.
Between January and August 2025, the Minint reported having recovered 350,000 liters of stolen fuel throughout the national territory.
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