Russell Bentley, US citizen, who fought for pro-Putin forces in Russia’s war against Ukraine has gone missing, say the so-called police in Russian-controlled Donetsk (temporary occupied territory of Ukraine).
Russell Bentley, 63, who is married to a Russian woman and has a Russian passport, disappeared after an attack by Defense Force of Ukraine, according to reports. He was last seen in Donetsk on 8 April 2024 before moving in an ‘unknown direction’, and his current location is unknown.
Bentley has posted that he was ‘heading west with the “Liberators of Ukraine”. We may stop in Kryiv, we may stop on the English Channel. We may liberate the USA.’
A visitor to Cuba, in 1999 he escaped from a minimum security US facility where he was being held for drug trafficking, Daily Mail reports.
‘I didn’t have to dig a tunnel or take anybody hostage,’ Bentley said.
‘But I did escape from prison.’
He was later captured and put in a high security facility to finish his sentence.
He became a fighter for pro-Putin forces in 2014 after breaking up with his yoga-instructor girlfriend, though he spoke almost no Russian.
He sympathised with the Russian rather than Ukrainian side.
He has lived in Donbas – Russian-occupied Ukraine – ever since.
He called himself the information warrior and had worked for a media outlet affiliated with Sputnik, a Russian state media outlet.
