Jailed U.S. Scholar May Face Spy Charges

Russian security officials said they may bring espionage charges against John Edward Tobin, a U.S. Fulbright scholar jailed on a drug conviction in Russia. His lawyers called the claim a dubious legal bid to keep Tobin behind bars.

An official at the Moscow headquarters of the Federal Security Service, or FSB, said the new accusations against Tobin could be based on the testimony of a Russian scholar who claimed that the American tried to recruit him as a spy. According to the FSB, Dmitry Kuznetsov named Tobin as an agent who interrogated him in a U.S. prison in January 1998.