U.S. Department of Justice, via The Associated Press
This image, included in the criminal complaint against Alexander Yuk Chin Ma, shows a screenshot from a video taken by an undercover FBI agent of Ma during a meeting in January 2019.
CNN
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A former CIA officer targeted in an FBI undercover investigation pleaded guilty Friday to providing national defense information to the People’s Republic of China, the Department of Justice announced.
Citing the plea agreement, the Justice Department said Alexander Yuk Chin Ma, 71, of Honolulu, who worked as a CIA officer for seven years in the 1980s, worked with an unnamed co-conspirator in 2001 to provide “vast amounts of classified U.S. defense information” to Chinese intelligence in exchange for tens of thousands of dollars.
CNN has reached out to Ma’s lawyer for comment on the guilty plea.
Ma then applied to the FBI’s Honolulu field office as a linguist, where he worked from 2004 to 2012.
“The FBI knew about Ma’s ties to Chinese intelligence and, as part of its investigation plans, hired him to work at an off-site location where its activities could be monitored and his contacts with China investigated,” the Justice Department statement said.
As CNN previously reported, while he was under FBI surveillance, Ma allegedly smuggled a digital camera into FBI offices to photograph classified documents and pass them on to his Chinese counterparts.
“Ma confessed that he knew this information, and information conveyed to him in March 2001, would be used to harm the United States or benefit China,” the Justice Department said Friday, referring to a classified document provided to Chinese intelligence officers.
According to the Department of Justice, “under the terms of the plea agreement between the parties, Ma must cooperate with the United States, including by submitting to questioning by U.S. government agencies.”
If the court accepts Ma’s plea, he will be sentenced to 10 years in federal prison at a hearing scheduled for September 11.
