Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez has hurled a major strike at the free press. Patricia Poleo, the fearless journalist who exposed government shenanigans over a mysterious car-bombing last year of a prosecutor, has been arrested — and along with a military man, a banker and a Cuban exile, charged with the murder herself.

The background to her story is here, here, here, and here.

Poleo is a dissident, and has even organized protests against Chavez, like this one we blogged here, but she has never engaged in or advocated violence against the Chavez regime. Her only obsession seems to have been in getting news scoops – scoops that absolutely enrage the government and make it very uncomfortable because of how it implicates them. She’s a real thorn in their side.

Charging her with the murder itself that she wrote about is a sign of some kind of new bottom falling out on freedom of the press in Venezuela, and will have a chilling effect on news-gathering. Nobody – nobody – believes she was involved in this. What’s more, a press conference about her case by her friends in the media was broken up by Chavez’s secret intelligence goons, signalling the government’s lack of interest in justice here.

Miguel Octavio has the first breaking news of this alarming story, as well as photos of the goons at the press conference in action here and here.

UPDATE: Daniel has a long but excellent analysis that goes through this case from begining to end. Well worth reading here.