Secret Service Nabs Roman Seleznyov

We could hunt all day for a spy story and not come up with one that is as interesting as Roman Seleznyov.  If you haven't see it yet, there are several stories like the one by Dan Murphy, in today's Christian Science Monitor.  
[ http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/Backchannels/2014/0708/US-nabs-alleged-Russian-hacker-and-Kremlin-cries-foul-video  ]  and it seems to have been picked up by most of the major news services.

Seleznyov is 30, so he is not some kid off the street, trying to make a name for himself in hacking.  According to the U.S. Attorney in Washington, he is "a Russian man who was indicted in the Western District for hacking into point of sale systems at retailers throughout the United States".  It so happens that his father is the Deputy of the lower house of the Russian Duma.  This is kind of like the John Boehner of Russia.

His father says he thinks he was taken to trade for Edward Snowden, a story repeated by several of the Russian news services, as preposterous as it might be.  Things have hit the fan in Russia over this, with the headlines there looking like the following:  

·      “Foreign Ministry concerned over US ‘hunt’ for Russian citizens in foreign countries”

·      “Moscow rips into ‘vicious practice’ of extraditing Russian nationals to US”

·      “Russian official slams US for turning down Moscow’s extradition requests” 

ITAR/TASS says Seleznyov confirmed detention of his son and says he may be traded for Snowden.   

Moscow is claiming Seleznyov was "kidnapped" by the U.S. Secret Service from the Maldives, an archipelago off India's south-west coast.  One article wonders why he wasn't charged in the Maldives if he was guilty of hacking, and raises the matter of law enforcement protocols in taking him away on an airplane.  We won't know that part of the story for some time yet, but it sounds like it will make a great movie.  

The Russians have been protecting their gangs of credit card thieves as long as I can remember.  Many years ago, I was in a senior manager's office when he talked to one, who by the way, spoke English like he was born here.  The guy admitted to taking the credit card numbers, but laughed a little when the manager suggested he stop doing that.  He wasn't arrogant about it;  he just thought it was mildly funny that someone could (1) find him, and (2) ask him to stop.  I thought it was funny too, but kept that to myself.  There was no way we were going to find him or get him out of the country.  Maybe we just had to get a warrant and wait for him to go somewhere that has an extradition treaty with the U.S.