American citizen Gene Spector has been sentenced to 13 years in prison in Russia for espionage. The specific details of his alleged activities remain undisclosed.
Spector is already serving time in a Russian prison for bribery, bringing his total imprisonment to 15 years. He was charged with espionage in August 2022, and due to confidential information concerns, the trial was held in private, with no additional details released at sentencing.
Born and raised in Leningrad, Spector later moved to the United States and acquired citizenship before returning to work in Russia. Until a few years ago, he was the director of a company developing cancer medications.
In 2022, he was arrested in a bribery case for allegedly facilitating a bribe to an assistant of former Russian Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich, involving approximately 4 million rubles (over 53,000 euros) in trips to Thailand and the Dominican Republic. Spector confessed and received a four-year sentence.
The United States has not yet responded to Spector’s recent conviction. At the time of the 2022 espionage charge, the U.S. Embassy told CNN it had no information on the matter.
Source: NOS