Why did Maria Butina not flee the U.S. back in April ?

[donkeypoofed]

April is when her apartment was searched and her electronics were seized. Considering she knows what she did and with who, and that the evidence that was seized via that search warrant would reveal alot, I just cannot fathom why she would stick around for another 3 months. She could've made her great escape in all that time! I wonder why she stayed?

[Sneederbunk]

1. Had to count her guns.

[Xipe Totec]

2. Arrogance nt

[Cicada]

3. She enjoys her life here, knows she would be swapped.

Anna Chapman was in custody only a couple weeks and returned a hero. Maria will also be treated like the hero she is to Russia. She achieved a great deal.

[OnDoutside]

13. Spot on.

[dalton99a]

4. Trump will get her out

Putin demands it

[beachbum bob]

5. she felt "untouchable" is my first guess, way most entitled people do.

[marylandblue]

6. They were probably tailing her the whole time anyway.

[PatSeg]

7. She was a pretty incompetent spy

She left so many obvious breadcrumbs all over the place. Not terribly covert.

[Cicada]

16. Jack Barsky, a real Soviet spy, said she was amateur but extremely effective

Jack refused to return to East Germany after living here for many years as a soviet spy. He told them he had aids, knowing aids scared them to death and would not want him back. He was an extremely well trained professional spy. He said she was an obvious amateur, made errors, but nonetheless was extremely effective. He said she got more done in just a few years than he did in his entire long tour.

He is now a US citizen. He says he grew to love our life and did not want to leave. He said watching Trump with Putin brought him close to tears, seeing Trump as such a gullible mark. He was also surprised at the gullibility of those who dealt with Maria. He said no one becomes someone in Russia today unless the establishment has arranged that or has agreed to that. As a result he thinks many Russians here have been asked to help their country such as by influence manipulation. He said we should suspect every Russian we deal with because surprisingly many will have a government task of some sort.

He said Europeans are far less trusting than Americans are.

[PatSeg]

18. That is fascinating

I hadn't heard of Jack Barsky before.

I am sure Maiiria was very effective, just not very secretive. She also looked like she was really enjoying herself.

[Lee-Lee]

8. She was probably ordered not to

She’s being used just like she was. It was more convieneny for her to be arrested and go to trial than to escape for her handlers.

[Leith]

11. I Thought the Same Thing

That means that she doesn't know much and she's expendable.

[Lee-Lee]

14. And the more her trial stays public the more diassry they sew here

You have to view this from the big picture goal of Putin.

The big picture wasn’t Trump in power. The big picture is as much destabilization as possible in the USA- once Trump is in power the next way to advance that goal is to create as much controversy around him and harm him as much as possible. And when the next President is in repeat.

[Hortensis]

17. Guessing not probably but definitely ordered to remain

and continue.

Rachel's show pointed out that she could have obtained diplomatic immunity very quickly simply by getting into a car sent by the government to pick her up, which then started moving. Don't know why starting to move would activate its status as protected territory, but in any case she may have been reassured that her chances of evading arrest were better than they were.

[Thomas Hurt]

9. She thought the GOP and NRA had her back.

[haele]

10. Time in a U.S. jail is what she agreed to pay when she left her job in Siberia to be a honeypot.

Remember, since the Rosenbergs, spies in the U.S. don't get executed, they just spend time in prison.
Which was probably better in her experience than living out the rest of a simple, rather sparse life as a grocer in Siberia. Considering that she was going to spend her youth - pretty much a decade in glittering splendor for a few years before she got caught. And when she would come back to Russia, she'd be a heroine of the State. What's a few years in a comparitively comfortable prison before you're extradited back home for all that?

Far better than giving up the farm life to be a prostitute in Moscow or St. Petersburg, where she might run afoul of the Russian Oligarchy/Mafia and certainly would get cast aside into the streets once she lost her youth and good looks and her trafficking value diminished.

Haele

[moondust]

12. Counting on the Pardon Fairy? n/t

[floppyboo]

15. Double agent fishing for bigger fish?