Bethesda resident Alan Gross, an aid worker imprisoned in Cuba since 2009 for allegations of spying, is en route to the United States, according to national media reports.

ABC News reports Gross' release was arranged in a humanitarian prisoner exchange to be announced by President Obama Wednesday morning at the White House. The agreement was reached following more than a year of secret back channel talks at the highest levels of both governments. The network says Gross is on a plane flying to Washington, D.C.

Gross' attorney described him as nearly toothless, barely able to walk because of arthritis and blind in one eye. He has been kept in a small room at a military hospital 24 hours a day with two other Cuban political prisoners. ABC News says Gross has refused medical and dental care or outside privileges, and had promised a hunger strike if not released by the end of this year.

To secure Gross' release, ABC News says the United States will release three Cuban agents convicted of spying on anti-Castro groups in Miami. Gross, 65, has been in prison in Cuba since December 2009 after he went to the island nation as a subcontractor for the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). He was sentenced to 15 years in prison for bringing computer equipment to Cuba illegally, part of a program to bring Internet connectivity to the country's Jewish population.

In those five years, Gross has lost his mother, the vision in his right eye and 100 pounds, according to a letter to President Barack Obama signed by 300 rabbis earlier this year.

In November 2012, Gross and his wife, Judy Gross, filed a lawsuit against the U.S. government and the contractor, Development Alternatives, based out of Bethesda. On Friday, a federal appeals court in Washington upheld the decision of the district court that the U.S. government was not liable since the incident took place outside the country, Reuters reported.

Background on Time in Cuba Gross, a contractor for the U.S. Agency for International Development, was arrested in Cuba in December 2009 for distributing Internet and communications materials on behalf of the agency.