The former US Marine held in Russia since last year on espionage charges appeared in court Thursday and declared his innocence — saying he’s more Mr. Bean than James Bond.
Paul Whelan — who has been locked up since his arrest Dec. 28, 2018, on charges that he allegedly received state secrets — took advantage of his brief appearance in Moscow court to plead his case to reporters.
“Russia thought they caught James Bond on a spy mission, in reality they abducted Mr. Bean on holiday,” Whelan said, referring to the suave spy and the childish clown from the British sitcom.
Whelan, 49, of Michigan, asked that the prosecutor and judge be pulled from his case for ignoring complaints that he was assaulted by guards in jail.
“Evidence that I provided has been ignored … Questions of law are always decided in favor of the prosecutors and the FSB (security service),” he said.
But the judge denied the requests — and announced that he was keeping Whelan in pretrial lock up until Dec. 29.
Whelan’s lawyer, Vladimir Zherebenkov, told reporters that his client was roughed up by a guard earlier this month after he was told not to run or sing in the prison yard — even though neither of those activities are banned.
Whelan, who also has Irish, Canadian and British citizenship, maintained that he was being framed and denounced the case against him as a “hostage situation.” He said he was being held for a possible prisoner exchange.
The trial is expected to begin in April or May “if all goes well” due to the enormous size of the case, Zherebenkov said.
Whelan’s family has said that he was in Moscow at the time of his arrest to attend a wedding of a fellow Marine veteran to a Russian woman.
Russia claims he was caught “red-handed” with a flash drive containing state secrets. Whelan says he took the USB from an acquaintance thinking it contained vacation photos.
The former Marine, who was discharged from the military for bad conduct, faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted.
The House of Representatives on Tuesday passed a resolution calling for Whelan’s release.
With Post wires
