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US to Arraign 11 with Spying for Russia

   VOA News 08 July 2010
   Russian spy suspects

Photo: AP

   Russian spy suspects

   Ten  alleged  Russian spies in U.S. custody are scheduled to appear in
   court Thursday to enter their pleas.
   They  will  all  appear  at  a  federal  court in New York City, where
   charges against them were filed.
   Robert  Baum,  a  lawyer for suspect Anna Chapman, says there may be a
   quick resolution to the case.  He suggested his client might accept a
   deal to plead guilty and be deported.
   Earlier,  the  family of a Russian scientist jailed for spying for the
   United States said he may be swapped for the U.S. spy suspects.
   People  close  to  Igor  Sutyagin say he has already been moved from a
   prison  in  northern Russia to a Moscow jail. They say he will then go
   to Britain.
   Sutyagin's  brother  tells  VOA the spy swap is the idea of the United
   States.
   U.S. and Russian officials have not commented.
   Wednesday,  U.S.  prosecutors  formally  charged  the  defendents with
   conspiring  to  act  as  secret agents. Nine of them were also charged
   with money laundering.
   An  11th  suspect remains at large, after being arrested in Cyprus and
   disappearing when he was released on bail.
   All  the  accused  quietly lived and worked in the United States while
   allegedly  trying  to  gather  information on U.S. nuclear weapons and
   politics for Russian intelligence. Â
   Sutyagin,  a  Russian nuclear expert, was arrested in 1999 and accused
   of  passing  secrets  to  a  British company that Russia claimed was a
   front for the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency. He was sentenced to 15
   years  in  prison in 2004. Sutyagin's father says his son is not a spy
   and never pleaded guilty.

   Some information for this report was provided by AP.

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