Sentenced to 16 years in a maximum security colony, a citizen of the United States and three more countries Paul Whelan reported an injury resulting from a conflict with another prisoner. The American’s lawyer, Olga Karlova, told Interfax about this.
“On the territory of the industrial zone of IK-17, during a domestic quarrel, a conflict situation occurred between Whelan and another convict. The latter struck P. Whelan in the face with his hand,” the colony told Interfax.
An agency source “familiar with the situation” said that Whelan was hit by “a convict from Turkey based on political differences.” At the colony's medical center, an abrasion under the American's eye was recorded.
According to investigators, former Marine Whelan began coming to Russia in 2007 and collected secret information during his trips, and also tried to recruit employees of the FSB and the Ministry of Defense. His sentence was announced in the summer of 2020.
Whelan’s brother insisted that the American came to Russia for a friend’s wedding. The defense says that Whelan was detained because of a flash drive that a friend gave him, deciding to frame the American for the sake of promotion in the service. Whelan himself believed that the storage medium contained photographs from a tourist trip.