US citizen Joseph Tater leaves Russia after detention and psychiatric treatment, TASS says

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MOSCOW (Reuters) -U.S. citizen Joseph Tater, who was detained in Moscow last August and later sent for compulsory psychiatric treatment, has left Russia, the state news agency TASS said on Friday.

“We are aware of reports that a U.S. citizen detained in Russia has been released, and we are monitoring the situation,” a State Department spokesperson said.

The spokesperson declined to comment further due to privacy considerations, but reiterated warnings of the danger posed to U.S. citizens in Russia and advised those traveling or living in Russia to depart immediately.

Tater, who according to a Kremlin source last month was one of nine Americans being held in Russia that Washington wanted returned in a prisoner exchange, was sentenced to 15 days in jail last August for “petty hooliganism” after being accused of abusing staff at a Moscow hotel, something he denied.

Russian state news agencies later said he was also being investigated on a more serious charge of assaulting a police officer, which carries up to five years in prison.

On April 6 a court ordered Tater be removed from pre-trial detention, saying he was not criminally responsible for his actions after doctors diagnosed him with a mental disorder, according to state media.

TASS reported on Friday that Tater had been discharged from the psychiatric clinic where he was being treated. It cited unnamed medical sources as saying that the clinic had no grounds to keep him there and had let him leave for outpatient treatment.

TASS cited a law enforcement source as saying Tater’s current whereabouts were unknown, but that he had left Russia.

(Reporting by Maxim Rodionov; Additional reporting by Daphne Psaledakis in Washington; Writing by Andrew Osborn/Gleb Stolyarov; Editing by Mark Trevelyan and Diane Craft)