A Russian appeals court on Monday upheld a nine-year prison sentence for Trevor Reed, a former United States Marine who was convicted last year of endangering the lives of two police officers in August 2019, charges he denies.
US Ambassador John Sullivan, who returned to Moscow last week after leaving in April amid a diplomatic crisis, said he regretted the court’s decision.“Today marks another sad milestone as Trevor Reed’s appeal was denied,” Sullivan said, in comments shared on Twitter by the embassy’s spokesperson.
“[It is] another absurd miscarriage of justice in Russia as the world watches,” Sullivan saidReed’s defence team plans to lodge a further appeal, the RIA news agency cited Reed’s lawyer as saying.
Reed, at the time a student from Texas, allegedly attacked police while drunk after attending a party in Moscow.
His family has cited what they say are irregularities in the proceedings and said the prosecution’s request for a nearly 10-year sentence was excessive.
“This is completely a political case,” Reed told journalists after his guilty verdict in July 2020. “I will be asking my government for political support.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin and his US counterpart President Joe Biden discussed the topic of prisoner swaps at talks in Geneva this month.
Biden and Putin agreed in Geneva to hold talks on arms control and to return their respective ambassadors to their posts, but discord remained between Washington and Moscow on human rights, cyberattacks, election interference and Ukraine.
The meeting on June 16 was the first between the two leaders since Biden took office in January, and lasted for more than three hours.
