Roberto Azcorra Consuegra, initially misidentified by the Cuban government as one of the men detained following a shooting off the island’s coast with the country’s coast guard, was among a group of Cuban exiles that attended a vigil held at Versailles Cuban Cuisine Restaurant on Thursday, February 26, 2026.
pportal@miamiherald.com
A small crowd gathered outside Cuban restaurant Versailles Thursday night to pray for the men killed and injured during a shootout with the Cuban Coast Guard off the island’s coast.
As patrons dined inside, a man wearing a Cuban flag paced along Southwest Eighth Street with an “assassins and terrorists” sign featuring photos of Raul Castro and Cuban leader Miguel Diaz-Canel. Agustin Acosta said he was there to pay “tribute” to the men killed and captured.
“It was a crime, a massacre,” he told the Miami Herald in Spanish.
The confrontation happened Wednesday one nautical mile northeast of the El Pino channel in Cayo Falcones, off the northern coast of the Villa Clara province in central Cuba, according to Cuban government officials.
Havana says a group of 10 Cuban nationals came aboard a boat registered in Florida armed and planning a “terrorist infiltration.” The Trump administration is investigating the allegations, but has said little beyond acknowledging that two of the men shot in the confrontation were U.S. citizens.
Roberto Azcorra Consuegra, who was initially on the Cuban government’s list of the people detained but was actually in Miami, came to show his support for the men in Cuba’s custody. Consuegra said he knew most of the men on the boat from gathering at places like Versailles.
He said he hopes the U.S. government has a “strong reaction.”
“This is the moment to give el punto final, ya,” he said.
The modest Thursday night crowd brought signs and Cuban and U.S. flags. They chanted libertad, for a moment. They talked about decades of repression on the island. They had questions, and expectations of a full investigation by the U.S. government.
“I have a lot of pain,” said Santiago Ferrer, who has lived in the United States for 25 years.
Ferrer, who still has family in Cuba, said he’s only ever been able to kiss his grandchildren through the phone.
He described Wednesday’s confrontation as history repeating itself with the Cuban regime. He said the government chooses to “assassinate los muchachos Cubanos.”
“Once again Cuba cries,” he said, his eyes watering.
Cuban exile Ramón Saúl Sánchez, president of Movimiento Democracia, was at Versailles “to mourn those killed and to pray for the end of violence in Cuba.”
Sanchez, who has organized about 24 “flotillas” to honor Cuban victims and protest the government, said the group of men likely faced 90 miles of rough seas on their travel to the island and had to evade the U.S. vessels before ultimately finding themselves face to face with the Cuban coast guard.
Michelle Marchante
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