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The US Department of Justice asked the court to stop the criminal case against Russian scientist Ksenia Petrova. The US Department of Justice addressed the federal court in Massachusetts with a request to stop the criminal case against Russian researcher from Harvard University Ksenia Petrova, accused of smuggling frog embryos. The attorney Igor Slabykh drew attention to this. The Agency requests to stop the case with a ban on re-indictment of the same charges. The court must decide. Telegram Justification. The prosecutor's office explained the decision as the need for rational allocation of resources. According to the prosecution, further proceedings would require significant time and distract from more important federal interests. 'At this stage, the cost of resources for continuing this criminal prosecution exceeds the public interest in its resolution,' writes the Department of Justice. As Slabykh notes, the court previously supported the defense motion to disclose the circumstances of the researcher's arrest. Context. Petrova was arrested in February last year at Boston airport. She arrived from a scientific conference in Paris with samples of frog embryos. The Russian admitted that she did not know about the need to declare biomaterials and did not intend to import them into the US secretly. Despite this, Petrova was detained, and her visa was canceled. The scientist was sent to a deportation prison. In May, charges were brought against her for smuggling, and in June she was released on bail. The US Department of Justice stated that it would seek the woman's return to her homeland. In April 2026, the federal court ruled that the cancellation of the researcher's visa was illegal. The Russian was afraid of deportation, as she could face political persecution in her homeland. After the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine she participated in various anti-war actions and created a petition demanding the resignation of Putin.
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