David Balladin Smith, 57, is charged with nine counts of felony criminal mischief. He was charged with seven counts of gathering information for the purpose of sending it to the Russian authorities, one for attempted communication and one for providing information to a person who he believed was a representative of the Russian state. Mr Smith was arrested by German police on August 10 last year on suspicion of gathering information from the embassy in order to transfer it to a foreign country. The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said it had worked with the Metropolitan Police to set up a prosecutor’s office and approved charges on November 15, after obtaining the attorney general’s consent. Mr Smith, who was then living in the German city of Potsdam, was extradited to the United Kingdom on Wednesday and will appear before the Westminster Magistrates’ Court on Thursday. The nine alleged offenses under the Official Secrets Act of 1911 and the Official Secrets Act of 1920 were committed between October 31, 2020 and August 10, 2021. A CPS spokesman said: “The prosecution against the accused is active and has the right to a fair trial. “It is extremely important that there is no reporting, commenting or exchange of information on the Internet that could in any way prejudge these proceedings.”
