Maria Butina deserves 1.5 yrs prison: Prosecutors

Bloomberg

Maria Butina may not have been a spy or trained intelligence officer, but she deceived the US on behalf of Russia, potentially threatening national security, and deserves 1.5 years in prison for her actions, prosecutors said.
The recommendation is at odds with a request by Butina’s lawyers, who argue she should be released immediately and permitted to return home.
Butina faces an April 26 sentencing after pleading guilty to being an unregistered Russian agent operating in the US.
In a court filing, prosecutors told US District Judge Tanya Chutkan in Washington that the 30-year-old Russian is “more than simply a Russian student interested in gun rights and international politics.”
Butina arrived in Washington as an American University student in 2016 and made inroads with Republican Party figures, including Scott Walker, at the time the governor of Wisconsin, and officials at the National Rifle Association. She asked a question of then-candidate Donald Trump at a conference. Butina acknowledged her failed duty to report to the US her association with Aleksander Torshin, a former Russian Central Bank deputy governor and ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin who now is under US government sanctions.