The indictment of Dmitry Sklyarov on Tuesday was just a first -- and predictable -- move in what may be a long legal chess game, experts say.

When the scheduled indictment of the Russian computer programmer was postponed last Wednesday, Sklyarov's supporters had hoped the case would be dropped and the Russian programmer would soon be released and allowed to return home. But neither the postponement nor subsequent decision to proceed with the indictment are unusual, and are actually to be expected in this complicated case, said lawyers, legal experts and others familiar with the case. Joseph Burton, Sklyarov's attorney, had told reporters from Reuters and the Associated Press last Wednesday that he wanted prosecutors to drop the case against Sklyarov, and said he was not specifically interested in a plea bargain -- although he would not rule it out. He asked for Sklyarov's scheduled indictment hearing to be pushed back a week so that negotiations could continue. The indictment filed on Tuesday charges both Sklyarov and his employer, ElcomSoft, with five separate counts of "conspiring, for commercial advantage and private financial gain, to traffic in a technology that was primarily designed and produced for the purpose of circumventing, and was marketed by the defendants for use in circumventing, the Adobe Acrobat eBook Reader." The conspiracy charges, and the addition of ElcomSoft to the case, are new developments, said retired British barrister Ian McDonnel.