Russia upheld the detention of an American Wall Street Journal reporter on Tuesday. Evan Gershkovich was arrested in Russia for claims of espionage on March 30. The Journal and the U.S. State Department deny the claims and say he was imprisoned unjustly.
Gershkovich made his first public appearance since the arrest, standing inside a glass cage on Tuesday. As most experts expected, the judge appointed to his trial denied the “appeal to lift his pretrial detention, leaving him in Russian custody,” The New York Times reported.
What happens next for Evan Gershkovich?
Now the 31-year-old American citizen will go back to Moscow’s Lefortovo prison — which is one of the more infamous prisons in Russia. According to the Times, “inmates are held in isolation with only rare visits by lawyers” in the prison.
In most espionage cases, trials are held privately and most likely lead to a guilty conviction. If he is convicted, he could be sentenced to 20 years in Russian prison.
Lynne Tracy, the U.S. ambassador to Russia, was allowed to attend the hearing and said, “I can only say how troubling it was to see Evan, an innocent journalist, held in these circumstances,” per ABC News.
No evidence to support the espionage claims against Gershkovich has been publicly released by Russia, the Journal reported.
“Of course he didn’t agree with his detention,” Maria Korchagina, one of Gershkovich’s lawyers on the case, told ABC News. “And he would like to prove that he is not guilty. And he would like to prove that there is a place for freedom of journalism.”
What does Evan Gershkovich say about Russian prison?
One of Gershkovich’s lawyers, Tatiana Nozhkina, said he is reading Russian literature in prison and that he was being fed porridge in the mornings and that the food was “normal,” Reuters reported.