ALEXANDRIA (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 05th November, 2021) The US prosecutor in the case of Russian citizen Igor Danchenko, the Russian citizen indicted on five counts for lying to the FBI, said he faces a sentence of up to five years in prison on each count as well as three years of supervised release, a Sputnik correspondent reported from the court in Virginia on Thursday afternoon.
Danchenko was released from the court after he appeared in front of a US district court judge.
A US grand jury charged Danchenko with five counts of making false statements to the FBI during the investigation into allegations of collusion between former President Donald Trump and Russia. The US authorities took Danchenko into custody earlier on Thursday as part of the probe into the origins of the two-year-long Trump-Russia collusion investigation, which ultimately found no evidence of any collusion.
According to court documents, Danchenko made specific allegations in the so-called Steele dossier accusing the Trump campaign of colluding with the Russian government. One of Danchenko's allegations was used to give US authorities the authority to spy on former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page, court documents revealed.
US prosecutors did not seek to detain Danchenko, but proceeded to arrest him because of the leak to the press about the charges filed against him.
Judge Theresa Buchanan ordered Danchenko to be released with an electronic monitoring device, but due to the device not being available immediately, she waived the requirement for such a monitoring bracelet.
Danchenko, who has Russian citizenship, was also ordered to surrender his passport in the next 24 hours.
The US prosecutor expressed concern over Danchenko's Russian citizenship, his alleged contact with an individual in the Russian embassy as well as an unidentified foreign source of income.
Earlier on Thursday, Danchenko's case did not show up on the court's public schedule and the court clerks could not see it on their system as well. However, a number of media representatives showed up at the court at least a couple of hours before the hearing started.
Danchenko walked into the courtroom at around 3:00 p.m. EST and wore a face mask. As Judge Buchanan read the charges against him, Danchenko appeared calm and smiled at times.
After the hearing, Danchenko's defense attorney walked out without taking any questions from the media, noting that a statement will be provided later.
