Team Infidel
Forum Spin Doctor
Washington Post
May 14, 2008
Pg. 4
Defendant Enters Guilty Plea in Espionage Case
By Jerry Markon, Washington Post Staff Writer
A New Orleans businessman pleaded guilty to espionage yesterday, admitting that he gave the Chinese government highly sensitive military information he obtained from a former Defense Department official.
Tai Shen Kuo, 58, said in court papers that he plied the official with gifts, cash and dinners to secure classified projections of U.S. military sales to Taiwan. He was paid $50,000 to pass the materials to his Chinese contact through e-mails and telephone calls to Beijing, the documents said.
Kuo pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in Alexandria to conspiracy to deliver national defense information to a foreign government. He faces up to life in prison when he is sentenced Aug. 8.
The former official, Gregg W. Bergersen, pleaded guilty last month and could receive up to 10 years in prison. He was a weapons systems policy analyst at the Arlington-based Defense Security Cooperation Agency before resigning a week before his plea.
Federal officials described Kuo as the main player in the conspiracy, the latest example of what the government says is China's increasingly aggressive efforts to obtain U.S. military and trade secrets. The activity has triggered a Justice Department crackdown, with at least a dozen investigations of Chinese espionage yielding criminal charges or guilty pleas in the past year.
"Espionage is a real and serious threat to our national security," U.S. Attorney Chuck Rosenberg said yesterday. Arthur M. Cummings II, an FBI executive assistant director, added that Kuo "compromised our national security for his own profit."
Plato Cacheris, an attorney for Kuo, said his client is cooperating with the FBI and called the investigation "a pretty low-level espionage case. The amount of money involved was only $50,000." Federal officials have said the case is not as significant as those involving Aldrich H. Ames or Robert P. Hanssen, spies who were also prosecuted in Alexandria and who did major harm to national security.
Kuo was aware of the government's crackdown, according to a statement of facts filed in court yesterday with his plea. At one point, he told his Chinese government contact that they needed to be especially careful because the United States was now "really . . . watch[ing] . . . China's spy action."
Court documents described how Bergersen and Kuo met over the past two years at restaurants in Alexandria and Loudoun County and in Charleston, S.C., and Las Vegas. The material that Bergersen gave Kuo, according to court documents, included all projected U.S. military sales to Taiwan for the next five years. Bergersen's attorneys and court documents said Bergersen was unaware that the material would reach China.
Kuo led Bergersen to believe that after Bergersen retired from the government, he would make Bergersen a part owner or employee of a company he was establishing to sell U.S. defense technology to Taiwan.
May 14, 2008
Pg. 4
Defendant Enters Guilty Plea in Espionage Case
By Jerry Markon, Washington Post Staff Writer
A New Orleans businessman pleaded guilty to espionage yesterday, admitting that he gave the Chinese government highly sensitive military information he obtained from a former Defense Department official.
Tai Shen Kuo, 58, said in court papers that he plied the official with gifts, cash and dinners to secure classified projections of U.S. military sales to Taiwan. He was paid $50,000 to pass the materials to his Chinese contact through e-mails and telephone calls to Beijing, the documents said.
Kuo pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in Alexandria to conspiracy to deliver national defense information to a foreign government. He faces up to life in prison when he is sentenced Aug. 8.
The former official, Gregg W. Bergersen, pleaded guilty last month and could receive up to 10 years in prison. He was a weapons systems policy analyst at the Arlington-based Defense Security Cooperation Agency before resigning a week before his plea.
Federal officials described Kuo as the main player in the conspiracy, the latest example of what the government says is China's increasingly aggressive efforts to obtain U.S. military and trade secrets. The activity has triggered a Justice Department crackdown, with at least a dozen investigations of Chinese espionage yielding criminal charges or guilty pleas in the past year.
"Espionage is a real and serious threat to our national security," U.S. Attorney Chuck Rosenberg said yesterday. Arthur M. Cummings II, an FBI executive assistant director, added that Kuo "compromised our national security for his own profit."
Plato Cacheris, an attorney for Kuo, said his client is cooperating with the FBI and called the investigation "a pretty low-level espionage case. The amount of money involved was only $50,000." Federal officials have said the case is not as significant as those involving Aldrich H. Ames or Robert P. Hanssen, spies who were also prosecuted in Alexandria and who did major harm to national security.
Kuo was aware of the government's crackdown, according to a statement of facts filed in court yesterday with his plea. At one point, he told his Chinese government contact that they needed to be especially careful because the United States was now "really . . . watch[ing] . . . China's spy action."
Court documents described how Bergersen and Kuo met over the past two years at restaurants in Alexandria and Loudoun County and in Charleston, S.C., and Las Vegas. The material that Bergersen gave Kuo, according to court documents, included all projected U.S. military sales to Taiwan for the next five years. Bergersen's attorneys and court documents said Bergersen was unaware that the material would reach China.
Kuo led Bergersen to believe that after Bergersen retired from the government, he would make Bergersen a part owner or employee of a company he was establishing to sell U.S. defense technology to Taiwan.