Wade E Roberts

Pvt. Wade E. Roberts, who is listed as a deserter by the U.S. Army, was quoted Wednesday as saying he was persecuted in the Army and fled to the Soviet Union because he was "given a chance to be a man." Tass, the official Soviet news agency, also quoted Roberts as saying his decision to leave his unit in West Germany was "politically motivated." Roberts, whom Tass described as the son of a metal worker in San Bernardino, Calif.

A U.S. Army private who defected to the Soviet Union has decided to become a professional snake catcher in the Soviet Central Asian republic of Turkmenia, the official Tass news agency said Friday. The news agency said that Wade E. Roberts, 22, and his pregnant West German wife, Petra, arrived in the Turkmenian capital of Ashkhabad on Friday to begin their new lives in one of the Soviet Union's most remote and underdeveloped republics. Roberts, of San Bernardino, Calif.

A U.S. Army private who defected to the Soviet Union has decided to become a professional snake catcher in the Soviet Central Asian republic of Turkmenia, the official Tass news agency said Friday. The news agency said that Wade E. Roberts, 22, and his pregnant West German wife, Petra, arrived in the Turkmenian capital of Ashkhabad on Friday to begin their new lives in one of the Soviet Union's most remote and underdeveloped republics. Roberts, of San Bernardino, Calif.

Pvt. Wade E. Roberts, who is listed as a deserter by the U.S. Army, was quoted Wednesday as saying he was persecuted in the Army and fled to the Soviet Union because he was "given a chance to be a man." Tass, the official Soviet news agency, also quoted Roberts as saying his decision to leave his unit in West Germany was "politically motivated." Roberts, whom Tass described as the son of a metal worker in San Bernardino, Calif.

A military judge today refused to dismiss a desertion charge against a U.S. Army private who fled his post in West Germany and went to the Soviet Union with his pregnant girlfriend. Pvt. Wade E. Roberts, 22, of Riverside, Calif., is being tried at a court martial on a charge that he deserted his Army base last winter and lived in the Soviet Union for eight months before returning to West Germany in November.

An Army private accused of deserting to the Soviet Union told the military judge in his court-martial he fled his West German base because he was harassed by his superiors and was told by his first sergeant to stop seeing his German girlfriend. Pvt. Wade E. Roberts testified on the first day of the court-martial at Ft. Dix, N.J. The 22-year-old serviceman from San Bernardino, Calif.

Military authorities here on Friday interrogated an American soldier who returned to the United States after defecting to the Soviet Union. Pvt. Wade E. Roberts, 22, of Riverside, Calif., has been in Army custody since his arrest Wednesday in West Germany. He defected in April but says he returned to the West because his West German girlfriend, Petra Neumann, is pregnant and he didn't want "to go around for the rest of my life having a charge from the United States hanging over my head."

Wade E. Roberts, the U.S. Army private who defected to the Soviet Union in April, said he is "country-hunting" after learning of East Germany's conditions for sheltering him. Roberts, 22, now living in Moscow with his West German girlfriend Petra Neumann, earlier said he had decided after a five-month stay in the Central Asian desert town of Ashkhabad that life might be better in East Germany. She is expecting a baby early next month.

A military magistrate ruled today that an Army soldier who defected to the Soviet Union should be detained at the Philadelphia Naval Yard brig for security reasons. In a 15-minute hearing here, magistrate Capt. Brenda Pifer said Pvt. Wade E. Roberts poses a risk of escape and could have knowledge about sensitive information. Roberts, 22, of Riverside, Calif., has been in Army custody since his arrest Nov. 4 in Europe. He was moved to Philadelphia on Sunday.

The Army ordered a general court-martial on a charge of desertion for a private who defected to the Soviet Union and then changed his mind and returned to the West. The order by Ft. Dix commander Maj. Gen. Rocco Negris overruled a recommendation for a lower-level prosecution made by an Army investigator who held a hearing last week into the case of Pvt. Wade E. Roberts.