During the nearly 15 months in Moscow’s notorious Lefortovo prison, Evan Gershkovich studied Russian literary classics such as “War and Peace” and played chess with his father in the United States via email. . He strives to stay in shape during the one-hour exercise time allowed each day.
Friends who corresponded with Gershkovich described him as a positive and strong-willed Wall Street Journal reporter, despite facing the wrath of Russian officials under President Vladimir V. Putin , but he rarely loses heart. He is scheduled to go on trial on Wednesday and faces up to 20 years in prison on espionage charges, a charge that he, his employer and the U.S. State Department have strongly denied.
“He may have had his ups and downs like everyone else, but he remained confident in himself and his rightness,” said Maria Borzunova, a Russian journalist who is Gershkovich’s Part of a small group of friends who organized the arduous task of collecting thousands of letters from well-wishers and translating them into Russian to successfully gain approval from prison censors.
At the heart of Gershkovic’s ordeal is a void – Russian authorities have released no evidence to support their claim that he was a spy. It is also unlikely that his trial in Yekaterinburg will be made public, as it has been declared secret, with no observers barred from attending and his lawyers barred from publicly revealing anything they have learned.
Shortly before the trial was expected to begin at 11 a.m. local time, reporters were allowed to film a freshly shaved Gershkovic as he stood in a glass cage in the courtroom, news agencies reported.
“We believe this is a sham trial based on false accusations and therefore the proceedings will be a farce,” Wall Street Journal publisher Almar Latour said in an interview. He added that it was impossible to predict how the trial would turn out. How to influence efforts to get Gershkovic released.
In a Russian trial, conviction is essentially a foregone conclusion, especially if the Kremlin is involved (as in this case). During his career, he acquitted only four defendants.
For more than five years, Gershkovich, an American citizen who grew up in New Jersey, traveled to Russia as a journalist and grew to love the country, friends said. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs re-issued its declaration certificate multiple times.
Now, he could become fodder for the Kremlin in a prisoner swap, like other imprisoned Americans recently. In finalizing such a swap, Russia insisted that the trial must first be completed, ostensibly putting both sides on equal legal footing.
“He is a bargaining chip for the Kremlin, they want to trade him,” said Pjotr Sauer, a reporter for the Guardian and a close friend of Gershkovich.
In April 2022, Russia exchanged Trevor Reed, an American convicted of attacking Russian police, for a Russian pilot jailed in the United States on cocaine trafficking charges. In the most high-profile recent case, in December 2022, the United States swapped notorious arms dealer Victor Bout for Brittney Bout, an American basketball star who was jailed for marijuana possession. Brittney Griner.
Asked about Gershkovic’s fate in a television interview in February, Putin said talks were ongoing but mentioned that further concessions were being sought. He said he might be willing to trade the journalist for Vadim Krasikov, a Russian convicted of the brazen murder of a former Chechen separatist fighter in a central Berlin park in 2019 Sentenced to life in prison in Germany.
Putin told foreign news agencies this month that dialogue between intelligence agencies was the best way to resolve such issues. A senior Russian diplomat said the negotiations were taking place through special secret channels.
Gershkovich, 32, was detained in March 2023 in Yekaterinburg, east of the Ural Mountains. ” and he was “gathering” secret information about a factory that produced tanks and other weapons.
Gershkovich is part of a group of young Western and Russian journalists based in Moscow. They took their role in introducing Russia to the outside world seriously: constantly striving to improve their mastery of the language, traveling extensively, and sharing a traditional weekend cabin in Peredelkino, a small village on the outskirts of Moscow known as a writer’s retreat. at.
Raised by Soviet immigrant parents, Gershkovic adopted the name Vanya and enjoyed Russian rituals like saunas and mushroom hunting, as well as sports like soccer and skiing, friends said. Wall Street Journal spokesperson Ashley Huston said his family could not be reached for comment on the trial.
But with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the environment for Russian journalists became threatening. Gershkovich was one of many journalists who left the country, but he returned regularly to understand how the conflict was changing Russia.
Given that no Western journalist has been accused of espionage since Soviet times, the prospect of jail time seems disturbing but distant. Borzunova said Gershkovich’s arrest crossed a line and made it clear that all journalists, not just Russians, were at risk.
“We thought official certification meant something,” she said, “but it doesn’t.”
Lefortovo has long been the capital’s main facility for incarcerating dissidents and other high-profile figures. Prisoners are locked in their cells 23 hours a day, with one hour of “exercise” time taking place in an equally small open space.
Gershkovich has met with his lawyers, and U.S. Ambassador Lynn Tracy has been allowed occasional visits. The U.S. State Department announced that he was “wrongfully detained.”
His friends started a letter-writing campaign to keep him connected. It received more than 5,000 letters from around the world, written by everyone from grandmothers to schoolchildren. Financial Times reporter Polina Ivanova said many people spoke in detail about the difficult experiences they had endured.
Peter Moltoff from the Netherlands describes spending two years in a Nazi prison camp during World War II. Now 99, he wrote that he knew what Mr. Gershkovic was going through, encouraged him to stay strong, and noted that he himself had lived a good life since his release.
Mr. Gershkovich’s friends were encouraged to some extent by his consistently high morale. Standing in the cage where the defendants are held during pretrial court hearings, he greeted other reporters, often with a smile and sometimes with his hands in the shape of a heart.
He maintained a sense of humor and wrote to a friend that prison porridge was no worse than some of the meals he had eaten as a child. Gershkovich worked as a clerk in the New York Times newsroom and briefly worked as a chef before entering journalism. His friends prepared a weekly care package to supplement the lack of fruits and vegetables in Russian prisons, as well as sweets for his birthday.
He returned the favor, making sure to send them birthday or holiday wishes. He asked friends to update him on their lives and even encouraged them to send him separate letters describing the same social events. “Like a real journalist, he wanted diverse sources,” Mr. Sauer said.
Mr. Gershkovich was a voracious reader and scoured the prison library for some of the thick foundational works of Russian literature, including Tolstoy’s “War and Peace” and Vasily Grossman’s “Life.” and destiny”. He also read poetry and writings about characters in prison. Initially, his friends tried to run a book club through letters by reading the same texts, but they couldn’t keep up with him, Ms. Ivanova said.
Time in prison honed his command of the language. “When he arrived, he already had a Russian baby, no slang, and now it’s lyrical and beautiful,” Mr. Sauer said.
From the moment Gershkovic was arrested, his friends said they expected a long ordeal, given the experiences of others.
Paul Whelan, an American accused of espionage, has been in prison since 2018. Sentenced to 14 years in a penal colony in 2022. Alsu Kurmasheva, editor of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and a dual Russian-American citizen, faces an extended prison sentence on multiple charges.
“We realize that this is going to be a marathon,” Ms. Bolzunova said. “This matter is not going to be resolved quickly and we have to be prepared for a long time to tell the story of a man the Russian regime says was killed for his work.” In custody.
