Photo: Muns / CC BY-SA 2.0 (2005 archive)
Federal prosecutors in Boston moved Tuesday to drop smuggling and false-statement charges against Harvard scientist Kseniia Petrova after a judge allowed her to seek government records to support her claim of selective prosecution, Reuters reported.
Prosecutors described Petrova’s claims as “meritless” but said continuing the case after the judge’s order “would divert significant time and attention from more substantial federal interests,” according to the court filing cited by Reuters. The decision to seek dismissal is not an acquittal or a finding that prosecutors acted vindictively.
Petrova, a Russian-born biomedical researcher at Harvard Medical School, was detained at Boston’s airport in February 2025 after returning from France. Her visa was revoked after officials found frog embryo samples in a checked bag that prosecutors said should have been declared to customs authorities.
She pleaded not guilty and said her supervisor had asked her to bring the samples back for experiments. The criminal case was filed in May 2025 while a federal judge in Vermont was considering her release from immigration detention in Louisiana; she was released on bail the following month, Reuters reported.
A records dispute preceded the dismissal request
Petrova’s lawyers argued that the charges were retaliation for her challenge to immigration proceedings, within a wider dispute involving the Trump administration and universities. That is the defense’s allegation, which prosecutors rejected.
A federal judge in Vermont ruled in April that her visa had been unlawfully canceled. A Boston judge last month concluded that she had presented enough evidence of selective prosecution to obtain government records supporting her claim, according to Reuters. Permission to pursue that evidence did not decide the claim itself.
A spokesperson for U.S. Attorney Leah Foley declined to comment, and Petrova’s lawyer had no immediate comment, Reuters reported. The featured photograph is a May 2005 archive of Harvard’s Massachusetts Hall, not Petrova’s laboratory or a scene from the case.
JBizNews Desk | Boston
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