Defiant Johns Hopkins doctor testifies she shared private patient records because she feared Russia
BALTIMORE -- Defense attorneys for the two Maryland doctors accused of providing the private medical records of patients to help the Russian government rested their cases on Friday afternoon.
The lawyer for Johns Hopkins anesthesiologist Dr. Anna Gabrielian only called his client to the stand in her own defense.
The lawyer for her husband, Army Maj. Jamie Lee Henry, called only a retired nurse who worked with him at Walter Reed Medical Center as a character witness.
Gabrielian told the jury she feared for her life and the lives of her family both in Maryland and Russia if she refused to share confidential medical files with an undercover FBI agent who she thought was a member of Russian intelligence.
"I didn't think I could give a firm 'no.' At this point, it's clear she works for intelligence," Gabrielian testified. "It's just a very scary situation on all angles. What exactly does the KGB want with me?"
Her attorney, Chris Mead, declined to comment to WJZ Investigator Mike Hellgren outside Baltimore's federal courthouse.
It all began months earlier when Gabrielian reached out to the Russian embassy on her Hopkins work email account offering what she claims was simply an offer of humanitarian aid to Russia in the war with Ukraine.
The FBI obtained the message and sent an undercover agent to meet with her—posing as a Russian operative—recording five hours of meetings.
Gabrielian testified she spotted the agent's camera and believed she was "in danger."
She said she provided records she believed were "useless" as part of a "test of loyalty."
Gabrielian told jurors that although she discussed President Joe Biden's medical records during one of the undercover conversations, she and her husband did not have access to them, thought it "absurd," and told the agent she would get fired for accessing the medical files of high-profile Johns Hopkins patients.
The prosecution called Gabrielian a liar who broke her oath as a physician for sharing the records—and broke her oath as a naturalized United States citizen because of an allegiance to Russia.
She testified she "did not have an allegiance to Russia but an affinity for the Russian people."
The prosecution noted she was fearful of her own contact with Russia but did not hesitate to share information about those in her care.
On Tuesday, both sides are expected to present their closing arguments before the jury begins deliberations.
Gabrielian admitted on the witness stand she was not proud of some of her words and actions and at times misled her husband, but the two were close in public, even leaving court hand-in-hand earlier this week.
