Rudolf Abel

William August Fisher (11 July 1903 – 15 November 1971), better known by the alias Rudolf Ivanovich Abel (Russian: Рудольф Иванович Абель), was a Soviet intelligence officer. He adopted his alias to alert his Soviet KGB handlers when he was arrested in the USA on charges of espionage by the FBI in 1957. Fisher was born and grew up in Newcastle upon Tyne in the North East of England in the United Kingdom to Russian émigré parents.