WASHINGTON — A former C.I.A. officer was charged with giving categorized data to the Chinese language authorities, the Justice Division introduced
WASHINGTON — A former C.I.A. officer was charged with giving categorized data to the Chinese language authorities, the Justice Division introduced on Monday, the newest in a string of former intelligence officers accused of spying for Beijing.
The suspect, Alexander Yuk Ching Ma, labored as a C.I.A. officer within the 1980s after which as a contract translator for the F.B.I. within the 2000s. He was arrested on Friday.
In keeping with a legal grievance, Mr. Ma, 67, and an unnamed older relative, now 87 and affected by debilitating cognitive illness, first supplied data to Chinese language intelligence officers in March 2001 about C.I.A. personnel, international informants, categorized operations, cryptography and different strategies of concealing communications, secrets and techniques for which they have been paid $50,000.
The accusations in opposition to Mr. Ma are the latest in a collection in opposition to former intelligence officers. In Might 2019, Kevin Patrick Mallory, a former C.I.A. officer, was sentenced to 20 years in jail for spying for China. In November, Jerry Chun Shing Lee was sentenced to 19 years in jail after pleading responsible to conspiring to provide categorized data to China.
“The path of Chinese language espionage is lengthy and, sadly, strewn with former American intelligence officers who betrayed their colleagues, their nation and its liberal democratic values to assist an authoritarian communist regime,” John C. Demers, the assistant legal professional normal for nationwide safety, stated in an announcement.
From 2010 to 2012, Chinese language officers rounded up many American informants in China, killing lots of them and destroying the C.I.A.’s community of sources within the nation. The position of some former American C.I.A. officers in revealing the id of the informants has been debated, although American officers haven’t publicly accused anybody of offering data that destroyed the community.
Mr. Ma and his relative recognized for his or her handlers no less than two people who Chinese language intelligence officers believed have been American informants. Mr. Ma supplied that data to China in 2006, properly earlier than the collapse of the bigger community.
In keeping with courtroom paperwork, Mr. Ma, working in 2006 as a translator on contract for the F.B.I., gave his older relative pictures of individuals whom Chinese language intelligence believed have been American spies. The relative recognized for Mr. Ma two of the 5 individuals whom Chinese language intelligence officers had requested about. Mr. Ma’s spouse then traveled to Shanghai to ship a laptop computer to Chinese language intelligence, in response to the Justice Division.
The courtroom paperwork additionally accused Mr. Ma of repeatedly copying categorized paperwork that he was requested to translate for the F.B.I., generally with a digital digital camera and different occasions with a photocopier. From 2006 to 2010, Mr. Ma took these paperwork from the F.B.I. workplaces in Hawaii the place he labored, in response to regulation enforcement officers.
It was not clear how a lot the Chinese language authorities paid Mr. Ma in whole. However along with an preliminary $50,000 cost, Mr. Ma returned from one journey to China with $20,000 and a brand new set of golf golf equipment.
Born in Hong Kong in 1952, Mr. Ma moved in 1968 to Honolulu, the place he turned a naturalized American citizen, attended college and graduated from the College of Hawaii at Manoa. He joined the C.I.A. in 1982, and was assigned the next 12 months to function an officer abroad. He left the company in 1989.
Mr. Ma seems to have lived in China for about 5 years, maybe working as an importer and exporter within the 1990s, earlier than returning to the USA in 2000.
The courtroom paperwork stated the federal government was not in search of the arrest of Mr. Ma’s relative due to his cognitive illness. The relative labored for the C.I.A. from 1967 to 1983, resigning after he was accused of utilizing his job to assist Chinese language nationals enter the USA.
Final 12 months, an undercover F.B.I. agent contacted Mr. Ma, posing as a member of Chinese language intelligence who was investigating how Mr. Ma had been handled and the way he was compensated.
The F.B.I. had obtained a secretly recorded videotape of Mr. Ma and his relative’s preliminary 2001 assembly with Chinese language intelligence officers.
The secret agent confirmed the tape of that assembly as a part of a ruse to trick Mr. Ma into believing the agent’s cowl as a Chinese language intelligence officer. Mr. Ma advised the secret agent that he had continued to work for Chinese language intelligence and recognized a few of the Chinese language officers within the 2001 assembly.
In a second assembly, the undercover brokers supplied Mr. Ma $2,000 for his work spying for the Chinese language, which he accepted.
In a last assembly this month, Mr. Ma advised the secret agent “that he needed ‘the motherland’ to succeed,” in response to courtroom paperwork. However he additionally stated that he had already supplied all the knowledge he had. He advised the secret agent that he was keen to work as a advisor to the Chinese language authorities, “however that he would like to debate alternatives after the Covid-19 pandemic has subsided.”