chloe
06-25-2009, 06:43 PM
SANTA ANA, Calif. – The fate of a Chinese-born engineer accused of passing critical trade secrets on the U.S. space program to China for decades was in the hands of a federal judge Wednesday after closing arguments ended in the nation's first economic espionage trial.
Federal prosecutors said Dongfan "Greg" Chung used his 30-year career at Boeing Co. and Rockwell International to steal 300,000 pages of sensitive documents, including papers on the Delta IV booster rocket and a phased array antennae for the U.S. space shuttle.
Chung, 73, has pleaded not guilty to conspiracy, economic espionage, lying to federal agents, obstruction of justice and acting as a foreign agent. He is free on $250,000 bail.
U.S. District Judge Cormac J. Carney was expected to issue a written verdict at a hearing sometime in the next two weeks. Chung opted for a non-jury trial.
FBI investigators found the papers stacked throughout Chung's house and even in a crawl space beneath the dwelling, according to court papers and testimony.
"Your honor, I'm just going to cut to the chase. Defendant is guilty of all counts charged in the indictment," said Assistant U.S. Attorney Ivy Wang. "Defendant is guilty ... because defendant intended or knew his actions would benefit a foreign government, specifically the People's Republic of China."
Wang said the information included specifications on a fueling system for the booster rocket that was so sensitive Boeing employees were ordered to lock away hard copies of documents related to it before leaving work each day.
The fueling system was designed to retract from the rocket in less than 30 seconds, just prior to liftoff, and the company invested $50 million in the technology over a five-year period using 30 engineers, Wang said.
"If any of Boeing's competitors in this field obtained this technology, Boeing will lose its competitive edge," she said.
The government case is being closely watched as a test for prosecutions under the Economic Espionage Act of 1996. The law was designed to help the government crack down on the theft of information from private companies that have contracts with the government to develop future U.S. space and military technologies.
The legislation became a priority in the mid-1990s when the United States realized China and other countries were targeting private businesses as part of their spy strategy.
Defense attorney Thomas Bienert Jr. told the judge Chung was not a spy. He said prosecutors had grossly exaggerated the case and misinterpreted evidence.
Chung may have tried to share unclassified, publicly available information with China more than 20 years ago but balked when his overseas contacts began requesting information that was more sensitive, Bienert said.
He cited as proof of Chung's refusal to cooperate a series of letters in which a man prosecutors have called his Chinese "handler" rebukes him for not writing and wonders about his long silence.
The attorney conceded that Chung "did some dumb things" and may have violated Boeing policy, but he insisted Chung stopped short of doing anything illegal. He added that his client simply brought thousands of documents home because he was a "pack rat" and said the government couldn't prove Chung had actually passed any of it to China.
"Mr. Chung walked an interesting line and certainly a risky line, but not a line that was criminal once we look at the evidence," Bienert said. "He's a guy who likes knowledge for the sake of knowledge, including sharing knowledge ... but he does that because he wants China to become more like America, not because he wants America to be under the thumb of China."
In the government's rebuttal, Assistant U.S. Attorney Greg Staples mocked that contention.
"The 300,000 pages of documents is not the work of a pack rat, it's a pack elephant," he said. "This is a very, very big red flag. It's as big as any red flag flying over China today."
Six similar economic espionage cases have settled before trial since the Economic Espionage Act was passed. Another is set for trial in U.S. District Court in San Jose later this year.
Chung, a naturalized U.S. citizen, worked for Rockwell International until it was bought by Boeing in 1996 and remained with the aerospace giant until he was laid off in 2002. He was brought back as a consultant on stress analysis after the Columbia space shuttle disaster in 2003 and was fired when the FBI began its probe in 2006.
The government believes Chung began spying for the Chinese in the late 1970s, just a few years after he became a U.S. citizen and was hired by Rockwell.
Prosecutors say they discovered Chung's activities while investigating the case of another suspected Chinese spy, Chi Mak. Searches of Mak's house turned up an address book and a letter containing Chung's name.
Mak was convicted in 2007 of conspiracy to export U.S. defense technology to China and sentenced to more than 24 years in prison. Mak was not charged under the Economic Espionage Act.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090625/ap_on_re_us/us_economic_espionage_7
Federal prosecutors said Dongfan "Greg" Chung used his 30-year career at Boeing Co. and Rockwell International to steal 300,000 pages of sensitive documents, including papers on the Delta IV booster rocket and a phased array antennae for the U.S. space shuttle.
Chung, 73, has pleaded not guilty to conspiracy, economic espionage, lying to federal agents, obstruction of justice and acting as a foreign agent. He is free on $250,000 bail.
U.S. District Judge Cormac J. Carney was expected to issue a written verdict at a hearing sometime in the next two weeks. Chung opted for a non-jury trial.
FBI investigators found the papers stacked throughout Chung's house and even in a crawl space beneath the dwelling, according to court papers and testimony.
"Your honor, I'm just going to cut to the chase. Defendant is guilty of all counts charged in the indictment," said Assistant U.S. Attorney Ivy Wang. "Defendant is guilty ... because defendant intended or knew his actions would benefit a foreign government, specifically the People's Republic of China."
Wang said the information included specifications on a fueling system for the booster rocket that was so sensitive Boeing employees were ordered to lock away hard copies of documents related to it before leaving work each day.
The fueling system was designed to retract from the rocket in less than 30 seconds, just prior to liftoff, and the company invested $50 million in the technology over a five-year period using 30 engineers, Wang said.
"If any of Boeing's competitors in this field obtained this technology, Boeing will lose its competitive edge," she said.
The government case is being closely watched as a test for prosecutions under the Economic Espionage Act of 1996. The law was designed to help the government crack down on the theft of information from private companies that have contracts with the government to develop future U.S. space and military technologies.
The legislation became a priority in the mid-1990s when the United States realized China and other countries were targeting private businesses as part of their spy strategy.
Defense attorney Thomas Bienert Jr. told the judge Chung was not a spy. He said prosecutors had grossly exaggerated the case and misinterpreted evidence.
Chung may have tried to share unclassified, publicly available information with China more than 20 years ago but balked when his overseas contacts began requesting information that was more sensitive, Bienert said.
He cited as proof of Chung's refusal to cooperate a series of letters in which a man prosecutors have called his Chinese "handler" rebukes him for not writing and wonders about his long silence.
The attorney conceded that Chung "did some dumb things" and may have violated Boeing policy, but he insisted Chung stopped short of doing anything illegal. He added that his client simply brought thousands of documents home because he was a "pack rat" and said the government couldn't prove Chung had actually passed any of it to China.
"Mr. Chung walked an interesting line and certainly a risky line, but not a line that was criminal once we look at the evidence," Bienert said. "He's a guy who likes knowledge for the sake of knowledge, including sharing knowledge ... but he does that because he wants China to become more like America, not because he wants America to be under the thumb of China."
In the government's rebuttal, Assistant U.S. Attorney Greg Staples mocked that contention.
"The 300,000 pages of documents is not the work of a pack rat, it's a pack elephant," he said. "This is a very, very big red flag. It's as big as any red flag flying over China today."
Six similar economic espionage cases have settled before trial since the Economic Espionage Act was passed. Another is set for trial in U.S. District Court in San Jose later this year.
Chung, a naturalized U.S. citizen, worked for Rockwell International until it was bought by Boeing in 1996 and remained with the aerospace giant until he was laid off in 2002. He was brought back as a consultant on stress analysis after the Columbia space shuttle disaster in 2003 and was fired when the FBI began its probe in 2006.
The government believes Chung began spying for the Chinese in the late 1970s, just a few years after he became a U.S. citizen and was hired by Rockwell.
Prosecutors say they discovered Chung's activities while investigating the case of another suspected Chinese spy, Chi Mak. Searches of Mak's house turned up an address book and a letter containing Chung's name.
Mak was convicted in 2007 of conspiracy to export U.S. defense technology to China and sentenced to more than 24 years in prison. Mak was not charged under the Economic Espionage Act.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090625/ap_on_re_us/us_economic_espionage_7