A U.S. federal judge sentenced on Thursday convicted Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout to 25 years in prison.
Bout’s lawyer Albert Y. Dayan said Judge Shira A. Scheindlin’s ruling is not the end for him and his client and they will keep on fighting to establish the truth.
Bout’s repatriation to Russia is also a possibility, Dayan added.
The U.S. Justice Department called for a 30-year prison sentence for Bout. In November last year, the jury of the Federal District Court of New York found him guilty of conspiring to kill U.S. officials and citizens, of acquiring and intending to use Russian-made Igla anti-aircraft missiles and providing support to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), considered a terrorist group by the United States.
The 45-year-old former Russian military officer has denied all the charges against him. In an interview with Voice of Russia Radio on Wednesday, he accused the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) of hypocrisy and double standards, saying that it was wrong to jail a person “just for what he has said, even if he has done no wrong” while many arms dealers in the United States go unpunished.
Bout, known as the Merchant of Death, was arrested in Thailand in March 2008 during a sting operation led by U.S. agents and extradited to the United States in November 2010 after spending more than two and half years in Thai prisons.
