Judges reject Pollard appeal to ease parole restrictions

A federal appeals court has rejected convicted spy for Israel Jonathan Pollard’s request to lift restrictive parole conditions.

The 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan issued the judgment on Wednesday, a week after hearing arguments.

The parole terms issued upon Pollard’s release from a federal prison in November 2015 after serving 30 years of a life sentence require him to stay in his New York home from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m.; to submit any computer he uses for inspection, and to wear a GPS-monitoring device at all times.

The device means that Pollard, who is Orthodox, is forced to violate Shabbat observance, his lawyer has said.

Pollard, 62, also must remain in the United States for five years, despite his desire to move to Israel.

Pollard’s attorney argued that the terms are overly severe because Pollard cannot remember the classified information he provided in 1984 and 1985 to Israeli officials and that he is not a flight risk, Reuters reported.

But the court pointed to his “propensity” to hand out classified intelligence, a well as the fact that the info he had leaked remained under wraps.

The parole condition “minimized the risk of harm he continued to pose for United States intelligence,” the court said, according to Reuters.

Pollard pleaded guilty in 1986 to conspiracy to commit espionage in connection with providing Israeli contacts with hundreds of classified documents he had obtained as a civilian intelligence specialist for the US Navy.

Times of Israel staff contributed to this report.