NOVOSIBIRSK. Jan 17 (Interfax) - Novosibirsk's 5th Appellate Court of General Jurisdiction has upheld the Primorye Territorial Court's five-year sentence handed down in the case of Robert Shonov, former employee of the U.S. consulate general in Vladivostok, who was convicted of confidential cooperation with foreign state representatives.
"The sentence was upheld. The appeal was dismissed," the Novosibirsk court told Interfax.
It was reported earlier that Shonov was charged with confidential cooperation with a foreign state. His trial was held behind closed doors. On November 1, the court sentenced Shonov to four years and ten months in a general-security penal colony and ordered him to pay a fine of 1 million rubles.
He was detained in 2023 for gathering information about the special military operation on an assignment from the United States.
According to the Federal Security Service, Shonov "was fulfilling assignments for the political department employees of the U.S. embassy in Moscow Jeffrey Sillin and David Bernstein to gather information about the special military operation, mobilization processes in Russian regions, problems and their impact on the protest activity of the population ahead of the Russian presidential election of 2024."