Moscow — A Russian-born U.S. citizen already imprisoned in Russia on a bribery conviction has been handed a second 15-year jail term for espionage, Russian news agencies reported Tuesday.
A Moscow court brought espionage charges against Gene Spector in August 2023. Details surrounding the case were not made public.
The U.S. State Department said it was aware of reports of the sentencing of a U.S. citizen in Russia and was monitoring the situation.
Spector, formerly an executive at a medical equipment company in Russia, was previously sentenced to more than three years in prison in September 2022 for enabling bribes to an aide of former deputy prime minister Arkady Dvorkovich. The aide, Anastasia Alekseyeva, was sentenced to 12 years in April for taking bribes of two expensive overseas vacation trips.
Dvorkovich was a deputy prime minister under Dmitry Medvedev from 2012 to 2018. He is currently head of the international chess federation FIDE.
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