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Texan Charged With Smuggling Night-Vision Scopes

DALLAS — U.S. authorities have charged a Texan woman with trying to smuggle three night-vision rifle sights to Russia.

A federal court affidavit filed in New York accuses Anna Fermanova, 24, of suburban Plano near Dallas, of trying to move the scopes in March without the proper export licenses.

The document says the devices were seized as Fermanova was boarding a plane for Moscow at John F. Kennedy International Airport.

The case was first disclosed on the web site Thesmokinggun.com. It comes weeks after Anna Chapman and nine other suspects pleaded guilty to being Russian spies.

But Fermanova's attorney, Scott Palmer, said Fermanova's case does not involve spying. He said Fermanova bought the rifle sights online for a friend of her husband, who lives in Moscow, and that they were to be used for hunting.

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