[citation needed] In a controversial sentence, on 14 August 2002, after the 2002 Venezuela coup d'état, the Supreme Tribunal acquitted Division Generals Efraín Vásquez (Army) and Pedro Pereira (Aviation), Vice-admirant Héctor Ramírez and Counter admiral Daniel Comisso in a rebellion trial.

[3](With the pronouncements made in April, the accused high-ranking officials did not ignore the Government, but the order issued by the President of the Republic to apply the Avila Plan, because it was contrary to the protection of the human rights of citizens and this would mean a massacre.)

The sentence argued that there was a "power vacuum" after the Military High Command chief, General Lucas Rincón announced that Chávez had resigned from office.

Chávez announced a strategy to revert the decision, creating a commission in the National Assembly to review the stay of the justices in the Supreme Tribunal, saying that "No nos vamos a quedar con esa, ahora lo que viene es un contraataque del pueblo y de las instituciones verdaderas, contraataque revolucionario" and that "Así que la AN que los nombró tiene que asumir su tarea, para evaluarlos y el que no tenga los requisitos habrá que sacarlo de allí".

[8] During the 2006 judicial year beginning, the justices of the Supreme Tribunal stood up from the seats of the Criminal Chamber to chant "¡Uh, ah, Chávez no se va!"

[10] On 20 August 2009, drug trafficker Walid Makled was captured in Cúcuta by the Colombian Administrative Department of Security (DAS) and later moved to Bogotá.

[12] On 16 April 2012, Aponte wrote an open letter from San José, Costa Rica, in which he claimed to have received orders and pressure from president Hugo Chávez to convict Iván Simonovis, security chief of the Metropolitan District of Caracas, as well as Caracas Metropolitan Police officers Henry Vivas and Lázaro Forero, applying the maximum sentence for their participation during the Llaguno Overpass events.

[18] Article 264 of the Venezuelan Constitution and Title V of the Supreme Tribunal of Justice Organic Law[19] contemplate an extense procedure of more than thirty days for the appointment of the justices, both main and alternate, in which it is required to form a Judicial Nominations Committee integrated by members of the National Assembly and civil society, which will do a preselection of candidates that will be submitted to the Republican Moral Council: the Ombudsman, the Public Ministry and the Comptroller General, which will do a second preselection that in turn will be submitted to the National Assembly, which will have a lapse of three plenary sessions to appoint the justices with the vote of two thirds of the deputies or a fourth plenary session with the vote of a simple majority in case of not getting two thirds of the vote.

[21][22] Both the opposition and several jurists have described the appointment as illegal for not being performed according to the constitution and the Organic Law, including the challenges period, their lack of responses and the omission of the definite selections of the candidates.

[31] After this, deputy Héctor Rodríguez, from the Great Patriotic Pole coalition, introduced an appeal to the TSJ on 7 January 2016 to declare null all of the acts of the National Assembly.

[32][33][34] Starting 2017, in an ordinary plenary session, the National Assembly, then presided over by Julio Borges, officially disincorporated the three contested deputies, complying with the condition of the Supreme Tribunal to end the "contempt".

[36] On 27 March 2017, in sentence 155, the Tribunal granted faculties of the National Assembly to Nicolás Maduro to legislate and "take the civilian, military, economic, criminal, administrative, political, juridic and social measures considered necessary to prevent a state of conmotion...".

[40][41] This included Attorney General Luisa Ortega Díaz, who during a press conferenced in the seat of the Public Ministry defined both sentences as a "rupture of the constitutional order".

[citation needed] Maduro qualified the Attorney's declarations as a "impasse" between the Public Ministry and the Tribunal, as the reason why the same day he convened a Nation Defense Council to discuss the review of sentences 155 and 156.

[50][51][52][53] On 7 June 2017, the Constitutional Chamber issued sentence 378, where the Tribunal decided that the president is empowered to summon a Constituent Assembly without a previous consultative referendum.

[64] In response to the rejection of the Tribunal, the Luisa Ortega challenged the appointment of the 13 main justices and 21 alternates for considering a lack of suitability and bias in their actions, as well as aggravating the crisis in the country.

[68] Afterwards, María José Marcano, former secretary of the Moral Council, accused William Saab of lying and presenting a forged document, since neither Luisa Ortega or she had signed the act, finding it being done illegally with political pressures.

[70] As a result of that election, the lame duck National Assembly consisting of Bolivarian officials filled the Supreme Tribunal of Justice with their allies.

[82] In December 2018, videos and pictures were leaked showing a glamorous Christmas party that counted with an expensive feast, including French wine, taking place in the Supreme Tribunal seat.

The images received considerable backlash from social networks, criticizing the costs of the party during the grave economic crisis in the country and the hypocrisy of the socialist regime.

[83] On 8 January 2019, Electoral Chamber justice Christian Zerpa defected and escaped to the United States, dissenting with the inauguration of Nicolás Maduro as president for a second period.

[86] Among the declarations given, he affirmed that many of the court's decisions responded to orders from the ruling party,[87] and stressed that Maikel Moreno, the current chief justice of the Supreme Tribunal, and Raúl Gorrín, president of the television channel Globovisión, are involved in corruption schemes.