Alexander Yuk Ching Ma was convicted of passing “a large volume” of classified defense information to Chinese spies in 2001. He later worked for the FBI.
Former CIA Officer Alexander Yuk Ching Ma was sentenced to ten years in prison on Wednesday. The 71-year-old had been convicted in May of spying for China.
The sentence was the result of a plea agreement, the US Justice Department said. The defendant avoided a lengthier sentence by admitting to his role in passing classified information to the Shanghai State Security Bureau (SSSB).
Ma worked for the CIA from 1982 to 1989. He was accused of conspiring with a relative, who had also worked for the agency, to deliver “a large volume” of national defense information to Chinese spies in exchange for $50,000 in 2001.
In today’s dollars (US), that’s roughly $90,000. Depending on what a large volume means, that’s not too shabby for a random CIA grunt. I also try to remember that not all classified info is actually that worthwhile. When I worked for the government, sending generic emails on a classified network could make them classified (unless you properly marked them as Unclassified, which most workers didn’t due to laziness).