Last night we brought you the story of Russian computer hacker Pyotr Levashov, who was arrested in Barcelona yesterday (link). Authorities from Spain and the United States have yet to specifically reveal his alleged crimes, but Russian state-run media made the odd claim that he had confessed to having rigged the U.S. election for Donald Trump. Now it’s been revealed that Levashov has a history of rigging elections for Vladimir Putin.

The New York Times has confirmed that the Pyotr Levashov in question is indeed alleged spam king “Peter Severa,” as we suspected when news of his arrest first broke yesterday (link). He’s used spambots to bring in significant revenue over the years in various malware and virus scams that had nothing to do with politics. But almost as an aside at the end of its article, the Times mentions that Levashov created a virus which spread fake news about Putin’s election opponent Mikhail Prokhorov in 2012.

In other words, Pyotr Levashov has a documented history of rigging elections for Putin. This may help explain why Russia Today – a television propaganda news outlet funded by the Kremlin – is claiming that Levashov’s own wife had acknowledged he’s guilty of having rigged the U.S. election in Donald Trump’s favor (link). Russia Today cannot be treated as a reliable source, but its actions do appear to have given away the Kremlin’s gameplan in this instance.

With Levashov having already rigged one election for Vladimir Putin, it’s now fair to say that it’s likely he was arrested last night for having rigged the U.S. presidential election in the manner Putin wanted. If so, then the Kremlin is now preemptively fingering Levashov in the hope of containing the scandal to just the one hacker who has already been arrested. But if anything, this scandal is just getting started. Contribute to Palmer Report