American freed from Nicaraguan jail has left country: supporters By Mary Slosson Fri Sep 14, 2012 5:38pm EDT (Reuters) - A U.S. citizen freed from a Nicaraguan jail after his 22-year prison sentence for drug trafficking was thrown out by an appeals court has left the country and is safe in an undisclosed location, his supporters said on Friday. Jason Puracal, whose case drew support from international human rights activists who said he was wrongly convicted, was found guilty of drug trafficking and money laundering by a trial judge last year along with 10 Nicaraguan co-defendants after being detained in 2010. Puracal, 35, left La Modelo prison in Tipitapa, just east of Managua, on Thursday after an appeals court ordered that he be set free. At the time of his release, a person familiar with the case told Reuters Puracal was restricted from leaving Managua. Jason is out of Nicaragua. He is in a safe and undisclosed location," a representative for Puracal's family said, without elaborating on where he may be or if he has returned to the United States. Representatives of the family have told reporters that he would not be making any public statements or doing media interviews for the foreseeable future. His sister, 33-year-old Janis Puracal, told Reuters on Thursday that the family wished to keep Jason close after the nearly two-year ordeal. "If this case has taught us anything, it's how much we value each other and being close to each other," she said in a phone interview. Family has always been a big deal to us. It was taken away from us without any choice on our part, and we don't want to let that happen again. Before his arrest, he was working at a real estate office in the Nicaraguan city of San Juan del Sur, a surfing destination on the Pacific coast. They said on Thursday that they were considering appealing to the country's Supreme Court. Reporting by Mary Slosson; Editing by Cynthia Johnston and Eric Beech