Pubdate: Mon, 17 Sep 2001
Source: Augusta Chronicle, The (GA)
Copyright: 2001 The Augusta Chronicle
Contact:  http://www.augustachronicle.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/31
Note: Does not publishing letters from outside of the immediate Georgia and 
South Carolina circulation area
Author: Eric Williamson, South Carolina Bureau
Related: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v01/n1448/a05.html

EX-RUSSIAN PRISONER STOPS IN AREA

Former Russian prisoner John E. ''Jack'' Tobin Jr. is a walking primer on 
what it means to be free. The lanky, 24-year-old Fulbright scholar strode 
off a plane in Augusta on Sunday morning.

He was greeted with cheers and hugs as he was reunited with family members 
from Aiken.

''You have to have your freedom taken away to really appreciate it, just 
like the attacks of the past week,'' Mr. Tobin said of his imprisonment 
overseas and the more recent terrorist attacks on U.S. soil.

The student, using his scholarship funding to study changes in Russian 
society since the end of the Cold War, was arrested on marijuana charges 
Feb. 1 in Voronezh.

He has maintained he was set up because the Federal Security Service, a new 
incarnation of the KGB, the old Soviet-era secret police, suspected him of 
being a spy in training.

Although he was released Aug. 3, his area relatives had not seen him since 
he left for Russia in September of last year. The scholar's research trip 
turned into an uncertain waiting game for them after he was handed a 
three-year jail sentence in February on the drug charges.

Because of mounting political and media pressure, the sentence was reduced 
to one year, and Mr. Tobin was paroled after serving six months. Mr. Tobin 
said Sunday the marijuana was planted on him, a common tactic for countries 
without strong human rights protections.

''They're the same people as the KGB, the same methods. They wanted to find 
out more about who I was, or they didn't like what I was doing for 
research,'' Mr. Tobin said.

He said his incarceration was drawn out because he had served a stint in 
military intelligence while in the Army and is still a member of the Army 
Reserve. The Russians wanted him to give secrets and collect more 
information for them, he said.

''They offered to clean it all up if I worked with them,'' he said.

Mr. Tobin tapped a cigarette out of its package and smoked it in the 
airport parking lot as he recalled his ordeal.

He gestured to the empty parking space he stood in at the airport.

''That's about how big the cells were,'' Mr. Tobin said of the prison where 
he spent nearly five months of his captivity. He compared the prison to a 
cramped county jail one might find in the United States. He said the 
conditions were bad, but not on par with the harsh conditions of larger 
Russian labor camps where he could have been sent.

His cell had two other inmates. Other cells housed as many as six.

Mr. Tobin said he was allowed to have only limited communication with U.S. 
Embassy officials, but that they made sure he was afforded every right 
other Russian prisoners have.

''The worst thing was knowing people at home had no idea what was going on 
with me,'' he said. ''I knew I was going to be all right.''

With a positive mind-set, Mr. Tobin treated the experience as another facet 
of his research. ''I was, in a way, fascinated by all of it, with life in 
the prison there.

''I learned to make glue out of bread (to stick items on the walls). I 
learned to make long ropes out of socks. The ropes would connect the cells 
on the wing from the outside.''

He said the prisoners would use the rope to transport bartered jail 
luxuries, such as cigarettes. They have a nickname, he said, for the 
makeshift device: ''the road.''

Mr. Tobin said his prison experience altered his outlook on life.

''I've lost some of the recklessness I might have had. My outlook is a 
little more cynical about the Russian authorities, but not about the 
Russian people.''

For now, Mr. Tobin is taking time, when he can, to visit with friends and 
family.

His stop Sunday, however, was just long enough to meet up with his 
grandfather, Edward M. Carey, who drove a special truck for transporting 
some of the hunting dogs he trains.

The two men were making good on overdue vacation plans to hunt ducks and 
geese in Canada. They began their long drive minutes after Mr. Tobin 
arrived at the airport.

His aunts who traveled to the airport to see him expressed a little 
jealousy, but they know they'll see their nephew when he returns in two weeks.

Mr. Tobin's travel south was delayed six days, the result of airline 
adjustments because of last week's hijacking tragedies. He was in New York 
on Tuesday when theWorld Trade Center was struck.

He watched from the rooftop of his girlfriend's apartment as the second 
World Trade Center tower disintegrated.

During the aftermath of the terrorist attacks, he transported a paramedic 
into Manhattan to help with the rescue effort.

He said it's a ''fine line'' balancing personal liberties and safety. He 
has no problem, he said, with stepped up searches and delays in airports or 
elsewhere if it translates to greater safety.

He said he was glad for similar precautions after terrorists struck a 
subway in Russia's Pushkin Square.

When Mr. Tobin returns home to Connecticut, final commitments related to 
his Fulbright scholarship will await. He also will tell his story at 
speaking engagements, including one at Harvard, and in a book.
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