A federal judge imposed a gag order in the case of accused Russian agent Maria Butina after concluding her defense lawyer “overstepped” the line in a series of news media interviews, NPR reports. U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan ordered that Butina, 29, continue to be detained after affirming that the Russian woman presents a serious flight risk. The judge also had a warning for prosecutors, who acknowledged they had misinterpreted messages between Butina and a friend to make the false claim that she was trying to trade sex for a job. “It took me approximately five minutes to read those emails and tell that they were jokes,” Chutkan said. “It was apparent on its face.”
The allegations generated sensational headlines, spikes of traffic online and comparisons between Butina and the recent film “Red Sparrow,” in which Russian operatives exploit their feminine wiles to get information. Prosecutors pointed out that the Russian government has visited Butina a half-dozen times since her incarceration in mid-July and that Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov twice spoke Secretary of State Mike Pompeo about her case. Butina’s boyfriend, Paul Erickson, contacted members of Donald Trump’s campaign in 2016 under the auspices of the National Rifle Association and offered to arrange back-channel contacts with the Russian government.