U.S. Army officer Gordon Black surprised his 6-year-old daughter in Texas with a video chat while on an overseas tour in South Korea, months before he was arrested in Russia.
But instead of a casual conversation, Black and his Russian lover got into a violent altercation, which his wife Megan claimed to have observed. His partner began to scratch at his face as the screaming got violent. She then took out a knife.
Black, a U.S. Army staff sergeant assigned to Camp Humphreys outside of Seoul, was detained in pre-trial custody on May 2 in Vladivostok, Russia’s far east, after an altercation. According to Russian police, Black was accused of stealing.
You two don’t have to be together, I informed them. One day, one of you is going to get hurt,” Jones remarked. “You understand that fighting is not a good thing to do all the time.”
For American officials currently handling a number of high-profile cases involving the incarceration of former US Marine Paul Whelan and Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich in Russia, Black’s arrest is a further burden.
The Russian government, the Pentagon, Black’s mother, and his wife have all denied any suggestion that espionage is a problem. The case has no political component, according to the Russian Foreign Ministry.
