[Daily Mail, where America gets its news] A sweet man, but perhaps a tad naive, despite being a Marine. - Paul Whelan, the US citizen imprisoned in Russia on spying charges, had been friends for 10 years with the FSB agent who handed him over to the Kremlin
- The former Marine had been making regular trips to Russia, beginning in 2007, making contacts in the country's military through the social network VK
- On one visit in December 2018, Whelan was found in a Moscow hotel room with a USB drive containing 'state secrets'
- Whelan maintained that his friend, FSB officer Ilya Yatsenko, had set him up and that he was innocent
- Following his arrest, Whelan was sentenced to 16 years hard time in a penal colony
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