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U.S. pastor who smuggled bullets into Russia is jailed for three years

A Russian court on Monday sentenced a U.S. pastor to three years in prison for illegally bringing hunting ammunition into the country.
Phillip Miles was arrested in a Moscow airport in February for smuggling in a box with 20 rounds of undeclared hunting ammunition in his luggage.

Miles said at the time it was a present for his friend, a pastor from the Urals city of Perm.

Moscow's Golovinsky district court ruled that the 52-year-old evangelist from Christ Community Church in Conway, South Carolina, will spend three years and two months in a prison camp.

South Carolina internet newspaper MyrtleBeachOnline said the ammunition was found by customs officials at Moscow's Sheremetyevo airport in late January, when Miles was entering Russia.

But the priest was allowed to continue his journey and was detained in Sheremetyevo on his way back from Perm.

Interfax news agency quoted Miles as saying he regretted violating Russian law, but he also called his sentence "severe".

The court rejected arguments by Miles, who has visited Russia more than once, that he was unaware of customs regulations for bringing in ammunition.

Defence lawyers said they will appeal against the sentence in Moscow city court.

The same thing would happen to an alien trying to enter the U.S. with ammunition. Non-immigrant aliens cannot possess ammunition except under strictly defined circumstances.

http://www.atf.gov/firearms/faq/faq2.htm#r1

Every country has customs regulations. If you violate them, you are in a world of hurt; and the U.S. government will not go out of its to help you. It is illegal in many countries to import Bibles or "subversive" literature.

Probably in a few months the U.S. will trade the unfortunate pastor for a Russian who is in jail in the U.S. That's how these things are usually handled.

- Jim

Its not a bogus ruling at all and the Russian court is not trying to "get back" at anything. The guy broke Russian law. He was presumably tried and convicted under Russian law. When you enter another country, you are subject to that country's laws. It might behoove you to have some sort of understanding of what those laws might be before you show up at customs with some sort of contraband.