Yevgeniy Nikulin, accused of Formspring, Dropbox hacking, wants a plea deal.

After more than a year of fighting extradition on computer hacking charges, the Russian was recently extradited from the Czech Republic. The charges on the indictment don't include meddling in the election. But, during the extradition fight, Nikulin's lawyer had written a letter saying that the FBI was pressuring him to confess to hacking Podesta's emails.

So this might get interesting.

https://www.cyberscoop.com/yevgeniy-nikulin-russian-hacker-linkedin-breach-plea-deal/

The legal team for Yevgeniy Nikulin, the Russian hacker accused of stealing data from LinkedIn and other American tech firms, will explore a plea deal with the U.S. government, according to Nikulin’s lawyer, Arkady Bukh.

“The likelihood of a trial is not very high,” Bukh said. The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, where Nikulin’s trial would occur, “has over a 99 percent conviction rate. We are not throwing clients under the bus,” Bukh said.

Nikulin was extradited to the United States in March after a lengthy legal battle in the Czech Republic where he was first arrested in 2016. He pleaded not guilty to the charges in his first hearing in the San Francisco-based court.

Nikulin is charged with breaches at LinkedIn, Dropbox and Formspring. He faces three counts of computer intrusion, two counts of intentional transmission of information, code, or command causing damage to a protected computer; two counts of aggravated identity theft; trafficking in unauthorized access devices and conspiracy.

http://www.newsweek.com/fbi-investigation-clinton-emails-russia-hack-607538

Nikulin was detained in the Czech Republic for allegedly hacking the servers of major sites LinkedIn, Dropbox and Formspring between 2012 and 2013. While awaiting trial, he claims in an undated letter reportedly given to U.S. Russian-language news site Nastoyashchoe Vremya by Nikulin's lawyer, Martin Sadilek, that the FBI visited him at least a couple of times, offering to drop the charges and grant him U.S. citizenship as well as cash and an apartment in the U.S. if the Russian national confessed to participating in the 2016 hacks of Clinton campaign chief John Podesta's emails in July.

" (They told me) you will have to confess to breaking into Clinton's inbox for (U.S. President Donald Trump) on behalf of (Russian President Vladimir Putin),” Nikulin wrote, according to The Moscow Times.

Nikulin said he refused the deal, but U.S. officials threatened to return. He claims the visits occurred in mid-November 2016 and on February 7 of this year. Czech television has reported at least one FBI visit earlier this year, according to The Guardian, which cited an FBI spokesperson as saying the agency was "aware of the situation," but declining further comment. The FBI is seeking to extradite Nikulin to face trial in the U.S., something he and his lawyers are trying to fight.