US Citizen Sentenced To 15 Years In Russian Prison For Spying, Leaking Biotechnology Secrets
The authorities believe this data could have been used by the US government to develop a genetic screening system for analysing Russia’s population.
US national Eugene “Gene” Spector, who was sentenced to 15 years in prison for espionage, had been collecting biomedical data in Russia, according to the country’s Federal Security Service (FSB).
The authorities believe this data could have been used by the US government to develop a genetic screening system for analysing Russia’s population.
The FSB alleged that Spector, acting on behalf of the Pentagon and a related commercial organisation, gathered and handed over biotechnological and biomedical data, including classified materials, to a foreign party. This data was intended to create a high-speed genetic screening system for Russia’s population.
Spector’s case is not an isolated incident. Over the past few years, Russian security services have accused several American citizens of espionage.
The escalation of the Ukraine conflict in February 2022 has also led to increased diplomatic tensions, with Moscow and Western nations expelling each other’s diplomats, claiming they are spies.
However, FSB in a media release on Friday as cited by RT, alleged that the “American national, acting in the interest of the Pentagon and a commercial organization affiliated with it, gathered and handed over to a foreign party various biotechnological and biomedical data, including classified materials, with the aim of creating a high-speed genetic screening system of Russia’s population by the US.”
On Monday, a court in Moscow sentenced Spector to 15 years in prison as well as a 14 million-ruble ($135,000) fine.
The former chair of the board of Russia’s Medpolymerprom Group, a supplier of disposable medical items, was handed the punishment in conjunction with his previous sentencing for acting as an intermediary in a bribery case.
In 2022, the US citizen of Russian origin was sentenced to 3.5 years behind bars after being found guilty of providing an aide to former Russian Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich with free trip vouchers from 2015 to 2016.
The judge ruled at the time that Spector had thus remunerated the woman for promoting the products of several pharmacy companies.
Last August, a court separately ordered his arrest on suspicion of espionage, though the details of the case were not made public.
Earlier this year, Russia and the US exchanged a total of 26 individuals held in several countries, in the largest prisoner swap of this kind since the end of the Cold War.
Among those sent to the US were Wall Street Journal correspondent Evan Gershkovich and former US Marine Paul Whelan – both of whom had been convicted of espionage in Russia. In return, ten Russian nationals who Washington accused of being intelligence agents and cybercriminals were sent to Moscow.
In September, Moscow declared six British diplomats persona non grata, claiming that their activities in the country “showed signs of intelligence and subversive work.” The UK Foreign Office dismissed the accusations as “completely baseless.”
