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Winona Family Seeks Word From Jacob Tyler, Believed Detained By Russian Authorities

WINONA, Minn. (WCCO) — The father of a Minnesota man says his son trying to flee Ukraine has been detained by Russian authorities.

It’s been an incredibly tough 24 hours for the family of Jacob Tyler, a 28-year-old man from Winona. He’s been living Ukraine for the past year teaching English at his wife’s school. That all changed this weekend.

Tyler’s father, John Quinn, says Tyler decided to flee the Ukrainian city of Kherson to stay with a friend in Germany. He says he boarded a bus to head that way through Turkey, but at a checkpoint in Crimea, the Russian military stopped them.

According to his Turkish friends who were also on the bus, he was the only American on board and was detained.

Now his father doesn’t know where his son is and wishes he could do more.

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“It’s heartbreaking that your child would ever have to go through that. It’s just something you don’t want to see your child go through. You wish you could be there yourself to do it, but it’s where we are at,” Quinn said.

He has been working with the U.S. government and Sen. Amy Klobuchar’s office.

“My heart goes out to Tyler’s family and we will do everything to locate him. My office is working with the State Department and U.S. Embassy in Moscow to find him and resolve this situation as quickly as possible,” Klobuchar said in a statement.

Tyler has shown up on Russian TV. His wife sent his father a picture of him being featured, talking about the treatment of detainees.

His father thinks he’s being used a pawn for Russian propaganda, but said at least that image of him suggests he is alive.


Source: CBS Minnesota

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