Harvard Divinity School student ANDREW OKHOTIN says corrupt officials have solicited bribes after he brought $48,000 for Russian charities.

When Andrew Okhotin touched down in Moscow’s Sheremetyevo II Airport on March 29 carrying $48,000 in American cash in his suitcase, he thought his job would be simple. Okhotin brought with him a customs declaration and a letter explaining the money’s purpose: he had come to Russia in order to distribute the donations his father’s San Diego-based Russian Evangelistic Ministries had raised for hard-up Christians in the former Soviet Union.

But instead of a simple charitable mission, Okhotin says he found himself entangled in a web of lies and corrupt prosecution. More than three months later, he is still forbidden to leave Russia—and his trial on charges of smuggling has just been announced for August 13.

Okhotin’s story has the stuff of an atmospheric Hollywood thriller in it, with ex-Soviet officials playing psychological games and customs agents soliciting bribes at every turn.

But its plot twists have been all too real for the Russian-born American citizen who took a term off from Harvard Divinity School (HDS) and was soon holding himself to a 27-day hunger strike while waiting for formal charges to descend on him.

Born For the Job

Those who knew Okhotin during his time at Harvard say he was a devout man and a diligent student.

“I found Andrew to be an exemplary scholar—intelligent, probing, rational, yet patient, open-minded and respectful of others’ opinions,” writes Lynette Mayo, an HDS student who took several classes with Okhotin, in an e-mail.

And Dunphy Professor of the Practice of Religion, Ethnicity and International Conflict David Little, with whom Okhotin studied closely, calls him “a very conscientious and thoughtful young man.”

There are many details of the first 28 years of Okhotin’s life which, viewed through the prism of his arrest and detainment in Moscow this year, stand out as haunting and inspiring hints of what was to come.

Between 1984 and 1987, Okhotin says—during which time he and his family were still living in Russia—his father, Vladimir Okhotin, was detained by Soviet authorities for his activities as a Baptist minister, which were seen as “libel against the state.”

Two years after Vladimir Okhotin’s release, the family emigrated to the United States, in hopes of escaping the persecution which had followed them in their homeland.

Okhotin graduated from University of California at Berkeley with a degree in economics in 1998. He soon found a job at a brokerage firm—but around Christmas of that same year, Okhotin says, he abandoned this career in order to address the plight of Shageldy Atakov, a religious prisoner in Turkmenistan.

“At that point it reminded me of what happened to my own family,” Okhotin says. “This was a decision that changed the course of my life for the next few years.”

In laboring full-time for Atakov’s release—which came in 2000—Okhotin says he took an active role, organizing letter-writing campaigns and prayer vigils much like the ones which are currently being held for him. During the Atakov case, Okhotin also met Rep. Joseph R. Pitts, R-Pa., who looms large in the present efforts on his behalf.

Last year, Okhotin came to HDS to pursue a two-year Master in Theological Studies degree. His focus at HDS during the three semesters he spent there has centered around “questions of religious freedom and human rights,” Little says.