CHEBOKSARY, May 7 (RAPSI) -Alexander Abnosov (Joshua Alexander Salotti), a Russian orphan adopted by American parents who made international headlines recently when he chose to return to his native country as a teenager amid allegations of parental mistreatment has been convicted of shoplifting and sentenced to 200 hours of punitive labor, a Cheboksary court told RIA Novosti Tuesday.

"The sentence came into force on April 23," the spokesperson said.

On March 10, Abnosov and his friend, Dmitry Prokopyev, attempted to steal three jars of coffee from a supermarket and were detained by the store security.

Prokopyev was given a six-month suspended sentence and one year of probation.

According to media reports, Abnosov fled the US family who adopted him five years ago when he was 13 years old and flew back to Russia.

He told Russian media that his US parents forced him to get a job when he was 15 and kept most of his pay, adding that his US mother nagged him repeatedly, struck him once, and that his adoptive parents kicked him out of the house last year, forcing him to live on the streets with a friend.

Prior to his adoption, the boy lived in a local orphanage in Cheboksary in the Volga region of Chuvashia. He claims that he was taken to the United States against his will and that he did not want to leave his grandmother.

The young man moved in with her after his return.

The adoptive parents, Stephen and Jacqueline Salotti, said they were shocked and offended by the abuse accusations, AP reported. According to the adoptive father, the boys behavior changed dramatically after a trip to Russia.

Furthermore, he ran away after his parents forbade him to take alcohol and drugs.

In January, Moscow banned Americans from adopting Russian children as part of legislation passed shortly after Washington adopted the so-called Magnitsky Act, which introduced sanctions against officials suspected of human rights abuses.

A spokesman for Russian President Vladimir Putin said the Magnitsky Act had triggered the adoption ban, but Russian officials also cite the deaths of at least 20 Russian adoptees in the United States during the past two decades as a driving factor in Moscow's push for the ban.