By EMMA BURROWS (Associated Press)
Evan Gershkovich has been to Moscow’s courts twelve times in the past year and it has become a regular occurrence for him.
He is taken from Lefortovo Prison to the courthouse in a van, led in handcuffs to a defendants’ cage in front of a judge for another hearing about his pretrial detention on espionage charges.
The hearings are always closed, his appeals are repeatedly rejected, and his time behind bars is continuously extended. Then he is taken back to Lefortovo.
Gershkovich was arrested a year ago while working for The Wall Street Journal in Yekaterinburg. The Federal Security Service alleges he was collecting state secrets on U.S. orders, but provided no evidence to support the accusation, which he, the Journal and the U.S. government deny.
The court hearings allow Gershkovich’s family, friends and U.S. officials to see him, providing a break from his otherwise monotonous prison routine.
Gershkovich’s mother, Ella Milman, told The Associated Press that seeing him brings mixed feelings of happiness and a reminder that he is not at home. They want him to be at home.
While Gershkovich often smiles in the brief appearances in open court, friends and family say he struggles with facing a wall of cameras pointing at him as if he were an animal in a zoo.
Before the most recent hearing, Milman was waiting for “a big reveal” — Gershkovich’s cellmate had given him a haircut. However, the hearing offered no new revelations on his case: He was ordered to remain behind bars until at least June 30 — the fifth extension of his detention.
Gershkovich's arrest a year ago came as a shock, as he was the first U.S. journalist taken into custody on espionage charges since Nicholas Daniloff in 1986. This happened despite Russia enacting increasingly repressive laws on freedom of speech after the invasion of Ukraine.
“He was accredited by the Russian Foreign Ministry. There was nothing to suggest that this was going to happen,” said Emma Tucker, the Journal’s editor-in-chief.
Gershkovich, the son of Soviet emigres who settled in New Jersey, moved to Russia in 2017 to work for The Moscow Times before joining the Journal in 2022.
“He absolutely loved it,” Milman said of her son’s life in Moscow.
He immersed himself in work and became close friends with other reporters. They spent time together doing various activities.
He also became close with other reporters and they are now advocating for his release.
His friends are now among the most vocal advocates for his release.
“For us, it’s got to the level where if we can see Evan smiling in the courtroom — that stuff that brings us a lot of happiness. It’s reassuring that he’s still not been broken by it,” said Washington Post correspondent Francesca Ebel.
His supporters say it's impressive, considering that Gershkovich is being kept in Lefortovo, a notorious prison from czarist times that was used during Josef Stalin’s purges, when executions were carried out in its basement.
Gershkovich is not permitted to make phone calls and wakes up to the same gray prison wall every morning. His friend, Polina Ivanova of the Financial Times, says it's terrible to think that he has been doing that every day for the past year.
He is allowed out of his cell for an hour each day for exercise. The rest of his time is mainly spent reading books in English and Russian, and writing letters to friends and family who make sure to keep him updated on current events and gossip.
This includes following his favorite English soccer team, Arsenal, which is having one of its best seasons, despite receiving scores about two weeks late. Gershkovich can only see limited highlights on Russian TV, but his friend, Pjotr Sauer of the British newspaper the Guardian, keeps him up to date.
Sauer said, “He is very happy about how Arsenal is playing but obviously upset he can’t see it for himself.”
Mikhail Gershkovich writes his son about chess strategy because his cellmate doesn’t like the game. They also talk about artificial intelligence because “he wants to be current when he comes back,” his father said.
There is no certainty about when that might be.
The Biden administration is trying to get Gershkovich released, but he faces 20 years in prison. Russia’s Foreign Ministry has said it would consider a prisoner swap, but only after a verdict in his trial, which has not yet begun.
U.S. Ambassador Lynne Tracy, who was in court again Tuesday for his latest hearing, said the charges against Gershkovich “are fiction” and that Russia is “using American citizens as pawns to achieve political ends.”
Since invading Ukraine, Russian authorities have detained several U.S. nationals and other Westerners, seemingly reinforcing that idea.
President Vladimir Putin has said he believed a deal can be reached to free Gershkovich and hinted he would be open to swapping him for a Russian national in Germany who fits the description of Vadim Krasikov, serving a life sentence for the 2019 killing in Berlin of a Georgian of Chechen descent.
The U.S. made an offer to swap Gershkovich last year, which was rejected by Russia. The Biden administration has not made public any possible deals since then.
Shortly after Russia invaded Ukraine, Gershkovich wrote on X, formerly Twitter, that “reporting on Russia is now also a regular practice of watching people you know get locked away for years.”
Proficient in Russian, Gershkovich knew the risks and, after his arrest, knew from the very start that this was going to take a long time,
The Journal’s Tucker said she is “optimistic that 2024 will be the year Evan is freed but I’m also realistic,” noting that any negotiations for a swap are taking place against a “very febrile” backdrop.
This includes tensions with the West over the war in Ukraine, the recent attack on a Moscow concert hall, and the U.S. presidential election.
People close to Gershkovich say he is using his sense of humor to cope with the difficult situation. Tracy mentioned outside the court on Tuesday that he has shown impressive strength and resilience in the midst of this serious situation.
While in prison, he has arranged gifts for his friends' birthdays and sent flowers to important women in his life for International Women’s Day earlier this month.
Milman stated that her son is advising people not to panic, which makes the family very proud.
However, as he starts his second year in detention, the pressure on his loved ones is becoming evident.
According to Milman, she wakes up every day and checks the time.
She mentioned, “I think about if his lunchtime has passed, and his bedtime,” expressing how difficult it is and the toll it’s taking on her.
