American contractor appeals 15-year sentence in Cuba

U.S. aid contractor sentenced to 15 years in a Cuban prison after he was caught distributing communications gear on the Communist island testified here Friday at an appeal hearing before Cuba's supreme court, which is expected to issue its ruling in the coming days, official media said.

"Alan Phillip Gross ... outlined the criteria he considered pertinent and expressed gratitude for the chance to personally explain them before the judges of the People's Supreme Tribunal," according to a note on the government Web site Cubadebate.

Gross was represented at the hearing by Cuban public defender Nuris Piñeiro, while diplomats from the U.S. Interests Section in Havana observed the closed-door proceedings.

Now 61, Gross was arrested Dec. 3, 2009, in possession of satellite communications equipment he said he was planning to distribute among Cuba's Jewish community. Havana says he was illegally aiding dissidents and inciting subversion on the island.

Early this year, Gross, a sub-contractor for the U.S. Agency for International Development, or USAID, was formally accused by the Cuban government of "acts against the independence and territorial integrity" of the country.

He was convicted in March and sentenced to 15 years behind bars.

The U.S. government has insisted from the beginning that Gross is innocent. Washington blasted his conviction as "unjust" and is demanding his "immediate and unconditional" release.

U.S. officials have categorically dismissed suggestions that Washington offer to trade five imprisoned Cuban spies for Gross.

The five Cubans were arrested in 1998 and convicted three years later by a federal jury in Miami.

A three-judge panel of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta overturned the spies' convictions in 2005, citing the "prejudices" of Miami's anti-Castro Cubans.

But the full court later nixed the spies' bid for a new trial and reinstated the original convictions. In 2008, another three-judge panel of the 11th Circuit again refused to overturn the convictions.

Havana acknowledges that Gerardo Hernandez, Rene Gonzalez, Ramon Labañino, Antonio Guerrero and Fernando Gonzalez are intelligence agents, but says they were spying on Miami's Cuban exile community, not the U.S. government.

Cuban officials say Gross smuggled satellite equipment into the country aimed at setting up an Internet network for dissidents.

Gross says he was trying to help connect the Jewish community to the Web.

"Friday's hearing affords Alan another opportunity to reiterate, through his Cuban counsel, that his actions on the island were never intended to be -- and in fact never were -- a threat to the Cuban government," Gross's U.S.-based attorney, Peter J. Kahn, said in a written statement.

The case chilled U.S.-Cuba relations after signs of thawing when President Barack Obama took office. The State Department has said no progress will be made until Gross is released.

Former President Jimmy Carter visited Cuba earlier this year and tried to secure the aid worker's release on humanitarian grounds, arguing that Gross' mother and daughter are battling cancer. But he went home empty-handed.

The appeals hearing is the final legal recourse for Gross.

According to Cuban state media, a decision will be announced "within days."

U.S. officials say they expect he will be found guilty, but once the trial is over it will clear the way for the government to consider releasing Gross on humanitarian grounds.