Convicted spy Jonathan Pollard walked out of a downtown Manhattan courthouse Friday morning after being fitted for electronic monitoring, a free man for the first time since he was sentenced almost 30 years ago in an extraordinary espionage case that occasionally complicated American-Israeli relations.
Pollard was released from federal prison in North Carolina but traveled to New York City to visit the probation offices at Manhattan federal court, where he sat in a waiting room Friday morning with other ex-cons — including at least one Latin King member who had the gang’s “LK” tattooed on his neck.
“I’m sorry, I can’t comment on anything today,” Pollard said as he walked out of the courthouse along with his wife and lawyers.
Pollard — who wore a navy blue yarmulke and glasses — got into a black SUV on Centre Street without answering questions about where he would be living or whether he would attend synagogue Friday night.
“The people of Israel welcome the release of Jonathan A. Pollard,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a statement. “As someone who raised Jonathan’s case for years with successive American presidents, I had long hoped this day would come.”
Pollard’s release from prison in Butner, North Carolina, came nearly 30 years to the day after his arrest for providing large amounts of classified US government information to Israel.
Pollard had been granted parole this summer from a life sentence imposed in 1987.
His lawyers have said they have secured a job and housing for him in the New York area, without elaborating. The terms of his parole require him to remain in the United States for at least five years, though supporters — including Netanyahu and some members of Congress — are seeking permission for him to move to Israel immediately.
The saga involving Pollard for years divided public opinion in the United States and became both an irritant and a periodic bargaining chip between the United States and Israel.
His release caps one of the most high-profile spy sagas in modern American history, a case that over the years became a diplomatic sticking point. Supporters have long maintained that he was punished excessively for actions taken on behalf of an American ally while critics, including government officials, derided him as a traitor who sold out his country.
“I don’t think there’s any doubt that the crime merited a life sentence, given the amount of damage that Mr. Pollard did to the United States government,” said Joseph diGenova, who prosecuted the case as US attorney in Washington, DC. “I would have been perfectly pleased if he had spent the rest of his life in jail.”
Seymour Reich, a former president of B’nai B’rith International who visited Pollard twice in prison, said that while he believed Pollard broke the law and deserved to be punished, his sentence was overly harsh. Like other supporters, he believes Pollard was “double-crossed” into thinking he’d be afforded leniency in exchange for a guilty plea.
“I hope that he settles down and lives the remaining years as best as he can,” Reich said.
Pollard, a former Navy intelligence analyst, was arrested on Nov. 21, 1985, after trying unsuccessfully to gain asylum at the Israeli Embassy in Washington. He had earlier drawn the suspicion of a supervisor for handling large amounts of classified materials unrelated to his official duties.
US officials have said Pollard, over a series of months and for a salary, provided intelligence summaries and huge quantities of classified documents on the capabilities and programs of Israel’s enemies. He pleaded guilty in 1986 to conspiracy to commit espionage and was given a life sentence a year later.
Though he has said his guilty plea was coerced, he has also expressed regret, telling the Associated Press in a 1998 interview that he did not consider himself a hero.
“There is nothing good that came as a result of my actions,” he said at the time. “I tried to serve two countries at the same time. That does not work.”
Under sentencing rules in place at the time of his crime, he became presumptively eligible for parole in November — 30 years after his arrest. The Justice Department agreed not to oppose parole at a July hearing that took into account his behavior in prison and likelihood of committing future crimes.
The parole decision was applauded in Israel, which after initially claiming that he was part of a rogue operation, acknowledged him in the 1990s as an agent and granted him citizenship. Israelis have long campaigned for his freedom, and Netanyahu said last summer that he had consistently raised the issue of his release with American officials.
Pollard’s lawyers also have sought permission for him to travel immediately to Israel, and two Democratic members of Congress — Eliot Engel and Jerrold Nadler, both of New York — have called on the Justice Department to grant the request so that Pollard can live with his family and “resume his life there.” The congressmen say Pollard accepts that such a move may bar him from ever re-entering the United States.
The White House has said it has no intention of altering the conditions of Pollard’s parole, and even friends and supporters say they don’t know exactly what’s next for him.
President Barack Obama’s deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes reiterated that stance on Friday, telling reporters traveling with Obama to Malaysia that “this is something that Prime Minister Netanyahu has regularly raised” in discussions with the United States.
“Obviously, the one thing at issue is the requirement that he remains in the United States,” Rhodes said. “But again, the president does not have any plans to alter the terms of his parole.”
Last year, the US dangled the prospect of freeing Pollard early as part of a package of incentives to keep Israel at the negotiating table during talks with the Palestinians. But the talks fell apart, and Pollard remained in prison.
More details about his plans were expected to emerge after his release.
“It’s a very unusual situation … I’ve been working with Mr. Pollard for 20 years, and even I don’t know where he is going or what he will be doing,” said Farley Weiss, an Orthodox rabbi who has been lobbying on Pollard’s behalf for two decades.