The special airplane on board which Bout was on landed Tuesday evening at a U.S. Air Force base near New York. And as early as yesterday, the Russian was due to appear in federal court in the Southern District of New York.
U.S. authorities accuse him of gruesome things: illegal arms trafficking, conspiracy to murder U.S. citizens and supporting terrorism. If the court finds Bout guilty, he faces life in prison. The Russian, who has already spent two and a half years in a Bangkok prison (where he was detained on a warrant from the U.S. Attorney’s Office), denies all charges. But even before the hearings begin, the Russian Consulate General in New York is going to hold a meeting with the defendant. In the meantime, Victor Bout has been placed in the Manhattan Detention Center, which is located in the heart of New York, next to the Brooklyn Bridge (see “Help ‘KP’). – Everything here will be intelligent and clean, just like in a hospital. All my clients in this establishment are white-collar,” said New York Lawyer Bukh Arkady Bukh. According to him, those who leave later to other prisons cry and remember this institution with warm words. Because in a regular prison, 90 percent of the inmates are hardcore gangsters, sitting for violence or drug trafficking. According to the lawyer, the authorities can nail Bout only by putting him in solitary confinement, which is the only form of psychological pressure possible here.
The Manhattan Detention Center (MDC), where Victor Bout was taken, is located next to the federal court building in the Southern District of New York, and is connected to it by a closed passage. This institution is known for its good conditions and contingent. As a rule, ordinary criminals are not kept in MSS. The main category of “tenants” are “white collars”, mafia leaders, bankers. The famous swindler Bernard Medoff, who recently received a century and a half in prison, John Gotti, a Mafia leader from the Gambino clan, and the now deceased Russian “thief in law” Yaponchik. He, by the way, was almost the only prisoner who put up a fight with the guards. Another Russian – pilot Viktor Yaroshenko – is also being held there. Recall that this summer the Americans, in violation of all international norms, kidnapped our pilot in Liberia and transported him to the United States (see kp.ru). Now he is accused of drug smuggling. The food in the prison is considered decent, but it is traditionally American: hamburgers and other cola. But there is a huge queue to see the medics. For example, Yaroshenko was able to see a doctor only after several months. Nikita KRASNIKOV
Source: https://www.kp.ru/daily/24592/760635/