Gershkovich's colleagues, family keep light shining on his wrongful detention in Russia

The U.S. government and the public must continue to shine a light on the wrongful imprisonment of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich in Russia in order to secure his release, his colleagues said Thursday, July 13, at a National Press Club press conference.

Gershkovich’s case will be presided over by a judge once it comes to court, and the entire process of charges, appeals and arbitration typically takes 12-18 months, with the next hearing scheduled for Aug. 30, said Jason Conti, general counsel for Dow Jones & Co., publisher of The Wall Street Journal.

“At some point there will be a trial that will not be public, so we will not get a whole lot of information out of Russia,” Conti said at the event.

Although interest in the case has been tremendously high around the world, “folks need to continue to know that this case is still ongoing,” Conti said, adding that the legal team in the United States and in Russia working on securing Gershkovich’s release are delivered a “gut punch every day” that he remains in captivity.

“This is not a Netflix show,’ Conti added. “This is real life.”

Dow Jones is working with the U.S. State Department, the Biden administration, house counsel and several law firms in the United States and in Russia to work with Russia to secure Gershkovich’s release. He is currently being held in Lefortovo Prison in Moscow and can only communicate with his attorneys via letters.

“There is nothing that requires us to wait for a conviction to get a deal,” Conti said. “Barring a deal, the case goes to trial. We don’t get to see much of the trial, and the conviction rate is basically 100%, which does not give us a lot of room to maneuver.”

The Russian legal system typically takes 17 months until a trial. Gershkovich was arrested on charges of espionage on March 29, which would mean that his trial may not happen until August or September of 2025.

Paul Beckett, Washington bureau chief of The Wall Street Journal, said Gershkovich was reporting straight news from Russia. He is the first American journalist to have been arrested on charges of spying in Russia since the Cold War and remained in the country after its invasion of Ukraine.

In best-case scenarios, Conti said, Russia holds prisoners accused of spying on state secrets for “12 months, unless the government determines there are extraordinary circumstances, in which case it could go to 18 months.”

It is critical that the public, major news organizations like The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, and The National Press Club continue to shed light on Gershkovich’s wrongful detention in order to secure his freedom, Conti and Beckett stressed.

“We have been encouraged by the amount of coverage this has received, and the challenge here, like the predicament of other journalists wrongfully detained, is to continue to keep up this high-profile coverage until he is released,” Beckett said.

What the public needs to know and to continue to combat are the “dangers that journalists now face around the world,” Conti said.

‘Growing wave’

China, Russia, Iran and other authoritarian states have wrongfully imprisoned and kidnapped Americans and will continue to do so, said Jason Rezaian, global opinions columnist for The Washington Post. When Rezaian was the Tehran bureau chief for the paper in 2014, Iranian authorities arrested him and his wife, accusing them of espionage and detaining them for a year and a half.

The world needs to continue to be able to get news from the ground in China, Russia and other chief countries, which is why reporting by Gershkovich and other foreign journalists in these and other important countries is so critical, Rezaian said.

“Democracy is on the brink,” he said, warning of “the lack of impunity with which these authoritarian governments are capturing journalists.”

Democratic nations need a better way to “deal with the growing wave” of journalist detentions, Rezaian said. Immediate, international sanctions against nations that wrongfully hold Americans or any other foreigners could be one effective tool, he said.

Support for the family

Help the public can provide extends to emotional and legal support for the Gershkovich family.

Danielle Gershkovich, Evan’s sister, said she and her parents are grateful for the backing of the Journal and the Biden administration. She receives photos of letters written to her by Evan about once a week, sent via email, and relies on news updates about his situation. .

Until she is reunited with her brother, Danielle says her family is trying to remain brave and to take solace in the short videos of him in the courtroom. In one, she said, she thought she saw Evan’s familiar “mischievous” smile.