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Princeton native Evan Gershkovich Wall Street Journal Who is the reporter? Detained in a Russian prison He was released on Thursday in a dramatic prison swap after being held for more than 16 months. He was arrested in March 2023 during a reporting trip in the country and charged with espionage.
In addition to Gershkovic, about two dozen other people were released in the Turkey swap, including former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan.
New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy has been working with U.S. officials to secure Gershkovic’s release.
“It is great to see New Jersey native and Princeton High School graduate Evan Gershkovich released from Russia,” Murphy said. Wrote on social media Thursday. “Thank you @POTUS and our allies involved in this complex, multilateral negotiation for your work to bring Evan and other wrongfully detained Americans home.”
The child of Russian Jewish immigrants, Gershkovich graduated from Princeton High School in 2010. He was captain of the high school football team, which won the state championship.
His parents fled to the United States from the Soviet Union in 1979.
Last month, Gershkovich, 32, was sentenced to 16 years in prison in a Russian maximum-security prison in a trial that the United States called a sham. He has refused to plead not guilty; he was accused of gathering intelligence on the Russian military, and the United States Wall Street Journal dispute.
Gershkovich was held in Russia’s notorious Lefortovo prison and his conviction was seen as paving the way for a prisoner swap between the United States and Russia.
His parents, Mikhail Gershkovich and Ella Millman, spoke about their son exist Good Morning America in March. They said they had written him letters and his father had even played long-distance chess with him.
In 2018, a Montclair couple, Cynthia and Richard Murphy, were revealed to be Russian “sleeper” agents who were part of a prisoner swap that sent them back to Russia. Their two daughters, who grew up in Montclair, were also on the swap.
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