Venezuela is clinging to a man — a chandler named Leonard Glenn Francis, known as “Fat Leonard”  — convicted of defrauding the American navy out of at least $35 million in one of the biggest scandals ever to shake the American armed forces.

Mr. Francis is cooling his heels in prison at Caracas more than a month after fleeing house arrest at San Diego while awaiting sentencing. Before and while on trial he gave vital evidence that resulted in the conviction of 33 Navy officers he’d provided with prostitutes, luxury hotel rooms, liquor and Cuban cigars, among other enticements.

Incredibly, the name of “Fat Leonard,” as the 350-pound, six-foot-three-inch Malaysian is widely known, did not come up in negotiations for the release last week of five Citgo executives who’d  been held for nearly five years plus two other Americans. In exchange Washington freed two notorious drug traffickers, nephews of the wife of President Maduro, who’d been sentenced to long terms in American prisons. 

Nor has “Fat Leonard” been mentioned, at least publicly, in critical talks on Washington easing sanctions against Venezuela so Chevron can again pump oil. The Biden administration hopes that talks with the Maduro government could represent a breakthrough with a regime that America still insists must permit free, democratic elections. 

Yet there’s no sign of bargaining to regain custody of Mr. Francis. Nonetheless, Washington is presumed to want him extradited, sentenced and imprisoned. Could it be that Mr. Maduro sees him as too important an asset to let the Americans have him back?

Mr. Francis, whose company provided basic supplies to American navy ships in Southeast Asia, is believed to be asking for safe haven in Venezuela, where he was arrested last month two weeks after cutting off the ankle bracelet that he’d been required to wear before leaving his home.

American authorities did not realize he’d left for seven hours after his disappearance on a journey that took him first to Mexico, Cuba,  and then Venezuela, where he was about to board a plane on his way to Russia.

Venezuelan authorities picked him up at Simon Bolivar International Airport, outside Caracas, on a tip from a taxi driver and received a request via Interpol for his extradition back to America. That process, however, is complicated by the fact that Washington has no diplomatic relations with Venezuela and does not recognize Mr. Maduro as the legitimately elected president.

Mr. Francis may turn out to be a far more valuable asset to Venezuela than any CITGO executives. He boasted of intimate knowledge of American Navy activities in Southeast Asia and had been influential enough to get senior Navy officers to order their ships into ports, notably Singapore, where his company could resupply them at much inflated prices.

Officers enjoyed quaffing expensive liquors, dining on fine foods and bedding down call girls all at his expense. Mr. Francis, finally arrested at a hotel in San Diego in 2013, pleaded guilty in return for what he hoped would be a relatively light sentence for testifying against his navy pals.

Now he’s assumed to be spilling all that he knows about American navy operations to the Venezuelans — and also may be an asset to the Russians. He may not have been privy to the Navy’s topmost  military secrets, but he boasted of a wealth of information that would be useful to America’s enemies, with whom he may be working closely after shaking off his captors.