Former prisoners allege abuse of freed American Stephen Hubbard in Russian custody

Two former Ukrainian prisoners have told the BBC that Stephen Hubbard, the 74-year-old American freed by Russia this week, was beaten and humiliated by guards during his detention. Their accounts describe what they say happened to him between his capture in Ukraine in 2022 and his release on 21 October.

Ihor Shyshko, a captured Ukrainian soldier, said he saw and heard guards beat Hubbard and that they treated him more harshly because he was American. At Pakino prison, Shyshko said, Hubbard’s knees and feet were covered in damaged skin. He recalled helping to bandage him because Hubbard had become too weak to do it himself. Shyshko also alleged sexual humiliation, hunger and inadequate medical care.

Dmytro Khyliuk, a Ukrainian journalist, said he heard guards threaten and mock Hubbard at an earlier prison, Novozybkov. He believed Hubbard’s health was deteriorating because he heard his complaints and the guards calling him more often to see a doctor. Both men later encountered Hubbard at Pakino.

Shyshko made similar allegations in interviews with AFP published in October 2024, while Hubbard was still in Russian custody. He told AFP that he had witnessed beatings and humiliation. On electric shocks at Pakino, however, he said Hubbard had told him about them; he did not say he saw those shocks himself. His earlier account predates Hubbard’s release, but it is another interview with the same witness, not a second eyewitness to those incidents.

Hubbard was sentenced by a Moscow court in October 2024 to six years and 10 months in prison on a mercenary charge. Russian prosecutors accused him of fighting for Ukraine; his legal team denied that he had taken part in military activity. After his release, his sister Patricia Hubbard Fox told the Associated Press that he had been starved and severely beaten. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said health concerns contributed to the decision to free him and that Hubbard had been unwell before entering Russian custody. That account does not settle what happened to him in prison.

Khyliuk separately alleged that Hubbard was hidden from international Red Cross visitors at Pakino to conceal his condition. In response to the BBC, the International Committee of the Red Cross said it requests to see every detainee wherever it is granted access. The organisation says its last visit to detainees in Russia was in 2024, but its statements do not establish whether delegates visited Pakino or whether Hubbard was hidden from them. Hubbard was taken for evaluation after returning to the US; what he may say about his treatment remains unknown.