RPT: PREVIEW - Russian National Maria Butina Set To Plead Guilty To Foreign Agent Charges In US Court

WASHINGTON (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 13th December, 2018) Russian national Maria Butina is set to appear before a US Federal court on Thursday to plead guilty to criminal charges that allege she served as a foreign agent for Russia on American soil, accusations that Russia has called groundless and politicized.

The hearing is scheduled to begin at 10:30 a.m. (6:30 p.m. Moscow time) at the US District Court for the District of Columbia. Judge Tanya Chutkan scheduled the hearing on Monday, after federal prosecutors and defense attorneys filed a joint motion to allow Butina to change her plea.

Butina previously pleaded "not guilty" to charges of conspiracy and failing to register as a foreign agent, insisting that she has not committed a crime. Russia has also said that the charges against Butina are completely unfounded.

But US media reports in recent days have said that Butina will change her plea as part of an agreement that she reached with federal prosecutors. The deal will see her plead guilty to conspiracy in exchange for a reduced sentence of 0-6 months. She will also cooperate with US prosecutors in their ongoing investigations, the reports said.

According to the terms of the agreement, Butina and an unnamed US person will admit that they "conspired" with each other to conduct a so-called "influence operation" under the direction of a Russian official, ABC News reported, citing an advanced copy of the plea deal.

The report identified the unnamed US person as longtime Republican operative Paul Erikson, who had a multiyear friendship with Butina. The unidentified "Russian official" in the agreement is believed to be Aleksandr Torshin, the deputy governor of the Russian Central Bank, the report added.

The reported plea deal comes after Butina spent months in a US prison in Alexandria, Virginia, held mostly in isolation and denied phone contact and medical treatment.

In November, Butina pleaded with the court to be moved into the prison's general population, so that she could interact with other people instead of spending all of her time in isolation. At the time of her request on November 27, she had been kept in solitary confinement for 67 straight days, according to court filings.

The court denied her request.

Butina's father, Valery Butin, has called his daughter's treatment "torture," saying the harsh tactics were designed to force her to confess to crimes she did not commit.

Russian officials have repeatedly complained of Butina's treatment and did so again on Wednesday after diplomats visited her in prison. In a statement after the visit, the embassy reiterated Moscow's demand that Butina be treated "humanely" and called for her immediate release, noting that she has been held in isolation for 22 hours a day. Diplomats have previously said she suffers claustrophobia after spending so much time in solitary confinement.

The embassy said Russian diplomats would attend Thursday's change of plea hearing.

Despite an impending plea deal, Russian officials remain firm in their denials of the allegations against Butina. On Tuesday, President Vladimir Putin revealed that Russian intelligence services knew nothing about Butina prior to her arrest. The Russian leader said that after the news first emerged of Butina's arrest, he asked all of the country's intelligence chiefs about her, but no one even knew who she was, except a small number of people in the Federation Council.

Even members of the US intelligence community have cast doubt on the allegations. Four former US intelligence officials who specialize in Russia matters told USA Today in an article published on Tuesday that Butina simply does not fit the profile of a Russian agent.

They noted that spies generally conduct their activities in secret and try not to draw attention to themselves, while Butina gravitated toward publicity and led a very open life as a gun rights activist, posting prolifically on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Her alleged "influence" campaign, they suggested, was more likely an open effort to cultivate goodwill toward Russia.

The allegations against Butina come at a time of increasing anti-Russian sentiment in the United States, with American officials accusing Moscow of meddling in all aspects of their country's politics, including elections. Russia has repeatedly rejected such accusations, calling them absurd and unsubstantiated by any evidence.