JURIST - Paper Chase: Defense Department official sentenced to 5 years for China espionage

[JURIST] A judge in the US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia [official website] Friday sentenced [DOJ press release] a former US Department of Defense (DOD) official to almost five years in prison for disclosing national defense information to Chinese agents. Gregg William Bergersen, an analyst at the DOD's Defense Security Cooperation Agency [official website], pleaded guilty [DOJ press release; JURIST report] to conspiracy for providing classified military information to Tai Kuo, a Louisiana businessman, who in turn gave the information to a Chinese foreign official. Kuo also pleaded guilty to conspiracy and could be sentenced to life in prison. In May, Yu Xin Kang [CICentre materials], a Chinese woman who is a permanent resident of New Orleans, pleaded guilty [JURIST report] to charges of aiding and abetting espionage by acting as an intermediary between Kuo and Bergersen. Reuters has more.

In another Chinese espionage case, Dongfan "Greg" Chung, a former Chinese-American engineer at Boeing [corporate website], was arrested in February and charged with stealing corporate trade secrets [PDF indictment] related to aerospace programs and turning them over to China [JURIST news archive]. Chung's and Bergersen's activities were allegedly linked by Chi Mak [CI Centre backgrounder; JURIST report], a Chinese-American engineer sentenced [JURIST report] in March for conspiring to smuggle sensitive naval intelligence data to China.

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