A former CIA officer who received numerous gifts and money in exchange for spying for China was sentenced to 10 years in prison on Wednesday.
The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) said in a press release that 71-year-old Alexander Yuk Ching Ma of Honolulu was sentenced for conspiring to gather and deliver national defense information to the People’s Republic of China (PRC).
In August 2020, Ma was arrested after admitting to an undercover FBI employee that he provided classified information to intelligence officers working for the PRC’s Shanghai State Security Bureau (SSSB).
Ma worked for the CIA from 1982 until 1989, and his co-conspirator and blood relative worked for the CIA from 1967 until 1983.
This image contained in the criminal complaint against Alexander Yuk Ching Ma shows a screenshot made from a video by an FBI undercover employee taken of Ma in January 2019 during a meeting. (U.S. Justice Department via AP)
Both men, the DOJ said, held top secret security clearances granting them access to sensitive and classified CIA information. The two men also signed nondisclosure agreements.
Ma admitted in the plea agreement that in March 2001 he was contacted by SSSB officers to arrange a meeting with them and his co-conspirator.
After convincing his partner, the two men met with SSSB intelligence officers in a Hong Kong hotel room for three days.
The DOJ said the co-conspirator provided the SSSB with a large volume of classified information for $50,000 in cash, and the two men agreed to continue assisting the Chinese agency.
Two years after agreeing to help the Chinese government, Ma applied for a job as a contract linguist for the FBI’s Honolulu field office. The FBI was aware of Ma’s ties with the PRC and hired him to secretly monitor and investigate his activities and contacts with the SSSB.
Ma reportedly worked part-time at an offsite location for the FBI from August 2004 until October 2012.
The SSB asked Ma to get the co-conspirator to identify four people of interest in photographs in February 2006, and the identities of at least two were provided.
The Department of Justice announced Wednesday that a CIA officer who provided top secret intelligence to China was sentenced to prison. (Ting Shen/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
The DOJ said Ma confessed he knowingly and willfully conspired with his partner and the SSSB to communicate and transmit information he knew would be used against the U.S. or to help the PRC.
During Wednesday’s hearing and in court documents, the government said Ma was convicted of a yearslong conspiracy to commit espionage. The documents exchanged were obtained by the co-conspirator from 1967 to 1983, the government said in the court documents.
As part of the agreement, Ma is required to cooperate with the U.S. for the rest of his life, which includes submitting himself to debriefings by U.S. agencies.
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He was also sentenced to 10 years in prison, followed by five years of supervised release.