NBC: Over the summer, federal prosecutors allege, operatives including a former Russian military officer, an officer in Russia’s FSB and two Cuban nationals living in Russia recruited a Brooklyn resident. They promised him $1,500 for photographs and recordings of locations in Washington associated with their target.
“This is gravely serious work,” one operative messaged, according to the indictment. “The video needs to be no less than 30 seconds from different angles.”
They instructed their recruit on how to case the house and record, how to cover his tracks and how to deliver the information — they asked him to put his phone in airplane mode to avoid detection — law enforcement said.
The U.S. resident — a Venezuelan national who was not identified — carried out the surveillance, but refused an offer of $40,000 to “disappear” the target himself, prosecutors said…