Alan Gross, former USAID contractor jailed in Cuba, appeals to Obama to intervene

[Jesus Malverde]

On the fourth anniversary of his imprisonment in Cuba, former U.S. government contractor Alan Gross said he fears his country has “abandoned” him and appealed to President Obama to personally intervene in his case.

In a letter to the president, sent via the U.S. diplomatic mission in Havana, Gross describes his isolation from the world, adding that his daughter and mother have been stricken by cancer, his wife has had to sell the family home in Maryland, and “my business and career have been destroyed.”

Gross, a 64-year-old Maryland native, was detained while distributing communications equipment to Jewish groups in Cuba under a contract with the U.S. Agency for International Development. He was convicted in 2011 of crimes against the Cuban state and sentenced to 15 years.

At the time of his arrest, Gross was on his fifth trip to Cuba, where he had been subcontracted to secretly distribute Internet equipment to the island’s small Jewish community under a U.S. democracy-­building program. Although the Internet is now available to Cuban citizens on a limited basis, it was prohibited at the time for all but government-sanctioned officials and individuals.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/alan-gross-former-usaid-contractor-jailed-in-cuba-appeals-to-obama-to-intervene/2013/12/02/6510294e-5b46-11e3-a49b-90a0e156254b_story_1.html