December 17, 2014 U.S.-Cuba relations, tense for half a century, are about to fundamentally change. Alan Gross, the American contractor who has been imprisoned in Cuba since 2009, will be released to the United States by the Cuban government, the White House announced Wednesday. The so-called "humanitarian release" will coincide with an exchange of three Cubans convicted of espionage in Miami for one unnamed U.S. intelligence asset.