A man living in Reading left the UK to be with his Internet girlfriend in Georgia, only to be abducted by Russia and tortured into confessing he was spying for Ukraine.
asserted
he → live → Ukraine
David Adrian Kercso, 23, was sentenced to 15 years in prison in Russia on espionage charges in March.
But according to his family, he was lured to Eastern Europe to pursue a romance with a woman he had met online.
uncertain
he → sentence → woman
Kercso was working for an electronics recycling company in 2023 when he connected with a Georgian woman named Valeria.
asserted
he → work → woman
An online romance blossomed, and his family says he travelled via Turkey in August 2024 to meet her.
asserted
he → blossom → her
According to Kercso's accounts to his family, the couple met up in the Russian city of Sochi, and after a few days crossed the border into Abkhazia, where Kercso - a Romanian national - stayed through the autumn.
But his mother said the relationship deteriorated as he began to run short of money, and he told his family he would return home.
uncertain
he → accord → family
His trip back to the UK was planned for November 28, 2024, but he never arrived.
asserted
he → plan → November
That day, he stopped answering phone calls and messages.
asserted
he → stop → calls
In subsequent letters from prison, Kercso said that was the day he was arrested in Abkhazia - a Georgian territory that is run by separatists.
asserted
that → say → separatists
David Adrian Kercso (pictured) has been sentenced to 15 years in a Russian prison on espionage charges
Footage released by Russia's FSB security service purported to show his arrest
The first announcement of Kercso's arrest came two weeks later from the Abkhazian separatist authorities, who released a video on December 13 depicting their own SGB security service leading the young man from a car into a building.
asserted
service → picture → building
He was shown confessing that he had been in contact with Ukrainian intelligence and had been told to film Abkhazian military sites with a drone.
asserted
he → show → drone
In his letters, Kercso says the initial confession videotaped in Abkhazia consisted of a text that he was ordered to memorise by his captors.
asserted
he → say → captors
The separatists told him that if he recited it on camera, he would be sent home.
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he → tell → camera
But instead, he wrote, he was brought to the border and transferred into the custody of the Russian FSB.
asserted
he → write → FSB
The day after the Abkhazians released their video, Kercso was in Russian custody, appearing before a judge at Sochi's Khostinsky District Court on December 14, according to court records available online.
uncertain
Kercso → release → records
It was the first of 10 court appearances that would be registered over the next four months, at which his detention in Russia would be extended roughly every two weeks.
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detention → register → Russia
In his letters, Kercso says that the staged Russian video of his 'arrest' was filmed in mid-April in Sochi, after he had already been captured in Abkhazia, transferred to Russia and held there for four months.
asserted
he → say → months
He was awakened in jail around dawn by FSB officers who took him to a nearby location to film it.
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who → awaken → it
The footage shows Kercso in a blue knitted hat and an Adidas backpack as he walks down a path.
asserted
he → show → path
Two burly security agents spring from a van and pin him to the pavement.
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agents → spring → pavement
'What is your name?' asks a voice in English as a gloved hand holds the man's face towards the camera.
asserted
hand → ask → camera
'David Adrian Kercso,' he swiftly responds, and tells them he is from Romania.
asserted
he → respond → Romania
Reuters analysis of the video and of court records of his detention shows that at the time the video was made, he had already been in Russian custody for months.
asserted
he → show → months
Kercso appears in a Russian court following his arrest
Though the exact date cannot be established, ample green foliage is clearly visible, showing it was filmed after the start of spring, and could not have been filmed before he began the four months of detention documented in his 10 Sochi court appearances since December.
uncertain
he → appear → December
The location - a strip of parkland along Sochi's Matsesta River - can be established from visible features.
asserted
location → establish → features
These include the pathway layout, a bridge pillar, lamp posts, trees, a grassy strip and a wall, all of which match archive and satellite imagery of the area.
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all → include → area
Evgeny Smirnov, a Russian lawyer familiar with the case, said it was common for the FSB to compel suspects to film dramatic arrest scenes long after they are detained.
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they → say → scenes
'We have seen this in dozens of cases where individuals detained months earlier are taken to a city street, a forest, or a train station so that a staged arrest video can be filmed,' he said.
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he → see → street
Kercso says in his letters that in the months following his transfer to Russia he was beaten, held in isolation and tortured.
asserted
he → say → isolation
Reuters could not independently verify those allegations.
uncertain
Reuters → verify → allegations
When he was sentenced, the FSB said he had transmitted the location of Russian air-defence systems in Sochi to a Ukrainian intelligence agency in the summer of 2024.
asserted
he → sentence → 2024
Video released by the agency showed him confessing to that charge.
asserted
him → release → charge
Kercso says that confession was also coerced.
asserted
confession → say → ?
'None of that happened, they stole my life for no reason and fabricated everything,' he wrote.
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he → happen → everything
He has learned Russian in prison, misses his family deeply and dreams of returning home.
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He → learn → family
'Now I know that coming here was a huge mistake,' he said.
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he → know → ?
'I was blinded by love and didn't see the warning signs.'
asserted
I → blind → signs
The Aporia
