Three Russian soldiers have been sentenced to a twenty-three-year prison term for torturing and killing a US volunteer fighting within the Ukrainain army.
Russell Bentley, a 63, went missing April last year after in the aftermath of shelling by Ukrainian forces. The defendants had beaten and killed the US nationa and then blew up his body to hide the traces of their crime. A military court in Donetsk handed over two soldiers 12-year sentences and a third 11 years.
Known as the “Donbas Cowboy,” Bentley appeared in a 2022 Rolling Stone profile detailing his shift from a left-leaning Texan to a “pro-Putin propagandist,” and had earlier been featured in Shaun Walker’s 2015 Guardian piece on anti-Ukrainian separatists in the Donbas. He had acquired Russian citizenship and had occasionally worked for the state-run outlet Sputnik. According to the court, soldiers encountered Bentley near a military repair site where he was preparing to film the aftermath of a Ukrainian strike. Ignoring his claim that he was a journalist, they covered his head with a sack and beat and tortured him until he died. A photo circulated in some Russian media on Monday showed him seated on a bed beside an assault rifle, a pro-Russian flag, a Texas memento, and a bust of Vladimir Lenin.
Comments
Leave a Reply
Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *