Illegals Program
Encyclopedia
The Illegals Program, as it was called by the United States Department of Justice
, was a network of Russian sleeper agent
s under non-official cover
whose investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation
(FBI) culminated in the arrest of ten agents and a prisoner swap
between Russia
and the United States on July 9, 2010.
The spies were planted in the United States by the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service
(known by its Russian
abbreviation, SVR), and were the target of a multi-year investigation by the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation
. The FBI investigation, called Operation Ghost Stories, culminated at the end of June 2010 with the arrest of 10 individuals in the U.S. and an eleventh suspect in Cyprus
. Ten sleeper agents were charged with "carrying out long-term, 'deep-cover' assignments in the United States on behalf of the Russian Federation."
The suspect arrested in Cyprus skipped bail
the day after his arrest. A twelfth person, a Russian national who had worked for Microsoft
, was also apprehended about the same time and deported
on July 13, 2010. The Moscow legal court documents made public on June 27, 2011, revealed that another two Russian agents had managed to flee the U.S. without being arrested.
Ten of the agents were flown on July 9, 2010, to Vienna
soon after pleading guilty to charges of failing to register as a representative of a foreign government. The same day, the agents were exchanged for four Russian nationals, three of whom had been convicted and imprisoned by Russia on espionage (high treason
) charges.
On October 31, 2011, the FBI publicly released several dozen still images, clips from surveillance video, and documents related to its investigation in response to Freedom of Information Act
requests.
, since the mid-1990s, before purchasing a nearby home in suburban Montclair
. Another couple named in court documents were journalist Vicky Peláez
and a man using the name of Juan Lazaro in Yonkers, New York
. The court filings allege that couples had been arranged in Russia to "co-habit in the country to which they are assigned", going as far as having children together to help maintain their deep covert status.
The criminal complaints later filed in various federal district courts
allege that the Russian agents in the U.S. passed information back to the SVR by messages hidden
inside digital photographs, written in disappearing ink, ad hoc wireless networks and shortwave radio transmissions, as well as by agents swapping identical bags while passing each other in the stairwell of a train station. Messages and materials were passed in such places as Grand Central Terminal
and Central Park
.
The Russian agents were tasked by 'Moscow center' to report about U.S. policy in Central America, U.S. interpretation of Russian foreign policy, problems with U.S. military policy and "United States policy with regard to the use of the Internet by terrorists".
According to the media reports, planning by the FBI to have the 'illegals' arrested had begun in mid-June 2010, but the action was hastened reportedly by some members of the group intending to travel outside the U.S. as well as by Anna Chapman's growing concern about having been exposed. Vladimir Guriyev was planning to travel to France and possibly Russia, Bezrukov was planning to travel outside the U.S. with his son, and Anna Chapman, in a telephone call to her father the day before the arrest, was suspicious that she may have been discovered to be an agent and was planning to leave for Moscow in mid-July 2010.
Ten of the agents involved were arrested by U.S. authorities on June 27, 2010, in a series of raids in Boston
, Montclair, Yonkers and Northern Virginia
. The individuals were charged with money laundering
(which can carry a penalty of up to 20 years' imprisonment) and failing to register as agents of a foreign government. No charges were offered that the individuals involved had gained access to classified material, though contacts had been made with a former intelligence official and with a scientist involved in developing bunker buster
bombs.
One of the suspects using the name of Christopher R. Metsos was detained on June 29, 2010 while attempting to depart from Cyprus for Budapest
, but was released on bail and then disappeared.
There is no evidence that the convicted agents knew each other beyond their respective spouses; they did not constitute any 'spy ring'.
Shortly after the arrests, the British Guardian
commented: "The FBI operation represents the biggest penetration of the SVR communications in recent memory. The FBI read their emails, decrypted their intel, read the embedded coded texts on images posted on the net, bugged their mobile phones, videotaped the passing of bags of cash and messages in invisible ink from one agent to another, and hacked into their bogus expenses claims. <...> The tradecraft used by the alleged SVR ring was amateurish, and will send shivers down the spine of the rival intelligence organisations in Russia. This was bungling on a truly epic scale. No secrets about bunker-busting bombs were actually obtained, but the network was betrayed. <...> To have a spy ring uncovered before they could actually do any serious spying is doubly embarrassing."
Coinciding with the day of the prisoners' swap, the death of the prominent Russian defector Sergei Tretyakov
who had died in the US on June 13, 2010, was reported on July 9, 2010; the Florida medical examiner's report released on September 20, 2010, cited an accident and a tumour as the cause of death. In response to allegations in the media that he might have tipped off the US authorities about some of the 'illegals', Tretyakov's co-author Pete Earley
in July 2010, citing anonymous "well-informed" sources, said that Tretyakov had not been privy to the case of Russian 'illegals'.
November 11, 2010, issue of Kommersant
, Russia's broadsheet, carried an article that, with reference to unnamed RF government sources, contained allegations that the 'illegals' had been fingered by a senior SVR officer named "Colonel Shcherbakov (Щербаков)" (according to an unnamed ex-CIA source, his full name may be Александр Васильевич Щербаков); the latter had, according to the newspaper's sources, headed the 'American' unit of the SVR department in charge of 'illegals' and left Russia for the US "three days prior to Dmitry Medvedev
's June visit to the US". According to other media outlets' sources, the name "Shcherbakov" was fictitious and a number of allegations made in the article were judged by experts and commentators to be either highly dubious or improbable; nevertheless, some comments made the following day by RF President Medvedev were interpreted as an indirect confirmation of the fact of a high-level defection in the RF intelligence apparatus. On November 15, 2010, Interfax citing unnamed sources within Russian intelligence claimed that the real name of the defector who was primarily responsible for uncovering the 10 convicted agents was Poteyev (reportedly, his full name is Александр Николаевич Потеев), who had a rank of Colonel in the SVR and had been deputy head of American department within Directorate 'S' of SVR ('S' oversees illegals). According to Interfax and other media sources, Shcherbakov did exist and also had held a senior position in the SVR; reportedly, he "had defected about two years ago".
, maiden name Anna Vasil'evna Kushchenko (Анна Васильевна Кущенко), whose former name according to U.S. authorities is "Anya Kushchenko", is a Volgograd
native (was born in Ukraine, according to some reports. Her father was employed in the Russian embassy in Nairobi, Kenya. She received her master's in economics degree from the Peoples' Friendship University of Russia
in Moscow. She later worked in London at NetJets
, Barclays Bank and allegedly at a few other companies for brief periods. In 2001, at an underground rave party in London's Docklands, she met Alex Chapman, the son of a British business executive, whom she married shortly thereafter in Moscow; they divorced in 2006. On July 2, 2010, Alex Chapman's revelations were made public; among other things, he claimed that he was not surprised by her arrest and that his ex-wife had "held secret meetings with Russian 'friends'".
The India One reports that Chapman may have been recruited to become an agent when she was in the United Kingdom citing Oleg Gordievsky and Alex Chapman as sources. An urgent probe is underway in the UK to ascertain whether Chapman organized sleeper cells in the United Kingdom.
Her LinkedIn
social networking site profile identified herself as CEO of PropertyFinder Ltd, a website selling real estate
internationally. Chapman posted photos of herself on the Odnoklassniki ("Classmates") social networking website in Russia where she stated "Russia, Moscow. My favorite place on earth, my native capital!". She also posted photos and profiles on the Facebook
and LinkedIn social networking websites.
Chapman's prior meetings with her Russian handlers had been on Wednesdays, not face to face, solely to pass information via encrypted private computer networks at Barnes & Noble
or at Starbucks
. Thus her suspicion was aroused when an FBI informant, posing as a Russian consular officer named "Roman", on Saturday, June 26, asked her to come to New York from Connecticut, where she was spending the weekend. Her suspicions increased when "Roman" was a different person than she knew. The task of a face-to-face transfer of a U.S. passport to another Russian agent was beyond the tasks that Moscow Center had previously assigned to her. After the meeting with "Roman", Chapman bought a new cell phone and two telephone cards. She called her father in Moscow and another individual in New York, both advising her not to transfer the passport; the calls were monitored by the FBI. Many former agents have publicly said that some of the slip-ups exposed by the FBI were downright humiliating. In perhaps the most famous example, Chapman registered the cellphone using a fictitious name and address (99 Fake Street) and the FBI retrieved the receipt, which Chapman had thrown away in a public garbage bin.
Chapman turned in the passport to the 1st Precinct police station in New York but was questioned by the FBI and arrested.
According to her American lawyer Robert Baum, when in the U.S. jail, she feared that she would be deported; when her deportation became imminent, she said she would go to live in London on her UK passport (which was subsequently revoked
, however). After her deportation to Russia, in July 2010, Robert Baum reiterated that his client had wished to stay in the US; he also said that she was "particularly upset" by the revocation of her UK citizenship and exclusion from the country.
Britain's tabloid Sunday Express
on August 8, 2010, cited an unidentified "source close to MI6" as saying: "There was a deal on the table just before she caught her connecting flight to Moscow. The secret service intercepted her on her flight back from America to Vienna, where her plane landed to refuel. MI6 were keen to know about other ‘illegals’ – Russian spy cells – hiding in Britain, so they made her an offer. In return they offered to give her back British citizenship and allow her to settle in London. Anna was having none of it though and told them in no uncertain terms that she wished to return to Russia."
In September German magazine Der Spiegel
reported that Chapman said she had been forbidden by the SVR from saying anything on her activities in the US.
, a Peru
vian national and U.S. citizen, and Mikhail Anatolyevich Vasenkov (Михаил Анатольевич Васенков, alias Juan Lazaro), a Russian citizen, were arrested at their home in Yonkers, New York
. Both admitted being Russian agents. The couple have a son together, and Peláez also has a son from a previous marriage. According to a report by The Wall Street Journal
in early August 2010, the real Juan Lazaro died of respiratory failure in 1947 in Uruguay
at age 3, with Vasenkov having presumably used the dead toddler's birth certificate to build a persona. According to a file kept by the Peruvian Interior Ministry
that The WSJ cited, Vasenkov flew on March 13, 1976, from Madrid
to Lima
on a Uruguayan passport in the name of Juan Jose Lazaro Fuentes; he bore a letter on a Spanish tobacco company's stationery saying he had been hired for a market survey in Peru; two years later, he submitted copies of the passport and a 1943 Uruguayan birth certificate with a letter asking Peru's military dictator Francisco Morales Bermúdez
(the country was then run by a US-friendly junta) for Peruvian citizenship which was granted in 1979.
"Juan Lazaro" was described as a "journalist and anthropologist" in the book Women and Revolution: Global Expression, for which he was a contributing author. Vasenkov had studied at the New School for Social Research and taught a class on Latin American and Caribbean Politics at Baruch College
for one semester during the 2008–2009 school year as an adjunct professor. According to The New York Times June 29, 2010, report, Vasenkov had been a vocal opponent of American foreign policy in class: "He maintained that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were a money-making ploy for corporate America. He praised President Hugo Chávez
of Venezuela and disparaged President Álvaro Uribe
of Colombia as a pawn for paramilitary groups that have broad control over drug trafficking." At least one student complained about Vasenkov's teaching and he was let go at the end of the semester. The department chairman reported that Vasenkov's instruction was not up to standard resulting in his teaching for only one semester but that he recalled no controversy over any anti-American views.
In 1983, "Juan Lazaro" married Vicky Peláez; two years later they moved to New York with her son from a previous relationship.
Peláez had been a television reporter in Peru and a columnist at El Diario La Prensa
in New York City. In her writings, Peláez was often critical of U.S. policy in Latin America and had supported liberation movements in those countries. In 1984, she had been kidnapped by the Túpac Amaru Revolutionary Movement
who demanded that a video of their views be broadcast on television in exchange for her release, though a cameraman who was also kidnapped claimed that Peláez had been a willing participant in the kidnapping. Vasenkov wrote a 1990 article for a European publication that spoke "glowingly" of the Shining Path
guerrilla movement.
U.S. officials reported that on June 27, 2010, Vasenkov confessed to being a spy and that "Juan Lazaro" was not his real name, though he declined to give his true identity. He additionally stated he was not originally born in Uruguay, and that Peláez had delivered letters to Russian authorities on his behalf. It was later reported that Lazaro's real name is Mikhail Vasenkov. In November 2010, Russian Kommersant
published Russian anonymous sources' allegations that while in US custody, Vasenkov had had three ribs and a leg broken by investigators trying to extract more information from him – a claim assessed by experts as utterly improbable; the Kommersant article also cited unnamed RF government sources as saying that Vasenkov had been presented with the SVR personal file on him obtained through a senior SVR defector ("Colonel Shcherbakov"), whereafter he was forced to own up to his real name.
On August 7, 2010, The Wall Street Journal
cited Vasenkov's American lawyer, Genesis Peduto, as saying that his client had indicated to her on the phone that he wanted to leave Moscow for Peru: "He doesn't want to stay in Russia. He says he's Juan Lazaro and he's not from Russia and doesn't speak Russian. He wants to be where his wife is going, to her native country, where it will be easier for Juan Jr. to visit. His family comes first." Boris Volodarsky tentatively suggested that Vasenkov's mother could have been from Spain and emigrated to the USSR in the wake of Spanish Civil War
(1936–1939).
Bezrukov and his cover wife Yelena Vavilova had a home in Cambridge, Massachusetts
. Heathfield had earned an M.P.A.
degree from the John F. Kennedy School of Government
at Harvard University
, where he was described as a "joiner". Heathfield claimed to have been the son of a Canadian diplomat and to have studied at a school in the Czech Republic. A fellow graduate of the Kennedy School noted that Heathfield kept careful track of his nearly 200 classmates, who included President of Mexico Felipe Calderón
. In 2010, Harvard Kennedy School stripped Heathfield/Bezrukov of his degree.
Bezrukov was a professional member of the World Future Society
, described by the Boston Herald
as "a think tank on future technologies that holds conferences featuring top government scientists". Former Al Gore National Security Advisor Leon Fuerth
spoke at the World Future Society 2008 conference in Washington, DC. along with George Washington University professor William Halal. In a July 2, 2010, Wall Street Journal article, Fuerth is quoted acknowledging he met Heathfield after a speech he gave. In the same article, Halal described his relationship to Heathfield as benign; "I would bump into him at meetings of Federal agencies, think tanks, and the World Future Society. I have no information that's of any security value ... Everything I gave Don was published widely and readily available on the Internet". Bezrukov was Chief executive of Future Map, a Cambridge consulting company involved in government and corporate preparedness systems.
Bezrukov's cover wife, Yelena Vavilova, worked for Redfin, a real estate firm in Somerville, Massachusetts
; she claimed to be from Canada
but also travelled on British passport
.
On July 16, 2010, Harvard University revoked Bezrukov's degree in public administration on the grounds of misrepresentation of the identity in his application.
Lidiya Guryev had attended school in the United States receiving two undergraduate degrees from New York University
and an MBA from Columbia Business School
. In 2009, Cynthia Murphy developed contacts in New York City financial circles as a means to obtain details about the global gold market. Lidiya had been trying to cultivate a relationship with Alan Patricof
, a venture capitalist who co-chaired Hillary Clinton's 2008 presidential bid, with her handlers telling her to "to try to build up little by little relations". Lidiya Guriyev was Vice president of Morea Financial Services in New York.
Vladimir Guryev supplied money and equipment to Kutsik (see below) in a 2004 meeting in Columbus Circle, New York and 2009, where $150,000 and a flash drive was given. When the computer program was inoperative, Guriyev supplied Kutsik with a laptop computer that Guriyev brought from Moscow.
Vladimir and Lidiya Guryev were arrested at their home in Montclair, New Jersey
. The couple have two young daughters, aged 11 and 9 at the time of their parents' arrest. Vladimir Guriyev used a false birth certificate
that claimed he had been born in Philadelphia, while his wife said that she had been born in New York City as "Cynthia A. Hopkins". The two had earlier lived in an apartment in Hoboken
since arriving in the United States in the mid-1990s. They then purchased a suburban Montclair home for $481,000 in 2008. When they purchased it, the couple argued with their handlers as to who would officially own the house, with the ultimate decision being that it would be owned by "Moscow Center".
Professor Nina Khrushcheva, who had served as Vladimir's faculty adviser at The New School
for three years starting in 2002, said in July 2010 that she had found it difficult to figure out a purported Philadelphia native: "I was always puzzled by the inconsistency between a completely American name and a completely Russian behaviour <...> He had a thick Russian accent and an incredibly unhappy Russian personality."
Vladimir Guryev was criticized by his wife for his poor information gathering and suggested that he pursue individuals with connections to the White House. The couple had also been tasked with obtaining information about U.S. policy in Afghanistan
, the nuclear program of Iran
and the latest Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty talks
. Shortly after the couple's arrest, one of their neighbors quipped: "They couldn't be spies. Look what she did with the hydrangeas."
n. They lived in the Seattle, Washington, area for about two years, and both attended the University of Washington, Bothell
, where they earned bachelor's degrees in business. Zottoli worked for several different jobs over the years including telecom company accountant, car salesman and teleconference firm employee. Pereverzeva was a stay-at-home mom who cared for their toddler son named Kenny, and a second son was born in late 2009. After Kutsik lost his job in 2009, they moved with their children to Arlington, Virginia, later that year. After their parents were arrested, arrangements were made to send the children to Russia.
Kutsik and Pereverzeva pled guilty to "conspiring to act as an unregistered agent of a foreign country." They appeared to be an ordinary married couple with two young children. However US authorities allege that they had both been spying for Russia in the US since at least 2004. They received specially coded radio transmissions from their high-rise Seattle apartment, and the FBI secretly entered their home where they found random numbers used to decode the "radiograms". Kutsik received money from Guriyev (Murphy) in Columbus Circle, New York in 2004 while Pereverzeva stood as lookout. In 2006, the FBI photographed them visiting the area of Wurtsboro, New York
, where they dug up a bundle of cash in a field that Metsos had placed there two years earlier. Kutsik visited New York again in 2009, where he evidently received $150,000 in cash and a flash drive from Murphy. Kutsik communicated with the SVR using a laptop that Guriyev brought from Moscow after the computer program supplied to him did not function.
Kutsik and Pereverzeva were arrested on June 27, 2010, at their Arlington, Virginia, home. Both had family living in Russia and prosecutors argued that bail be denied under the circumstances.
On January 13, 2011, Russia's oil pipeline monopoly, Transneft
, confirmed that Natalya Pereverzeva had been appointed an adviser for foreign economic relations to the company's president, Nikolai Tokarev.
. He had also attended school and received graduate degrees in the United States at Seton Hall University
, one of the degrees being from the Whitehead School of Diplomacy. He is fluent in English, Russian, Mandarin and Spanish. He had later worked for the Conference Board
in New York City in 2009, and for 2009–2010 reportedly worked at Travel All Russia, an Arlington, Virginia, travel agency, helping Chinese and Hispanic
travelers plan trips. He appeared to be in his late 20s; his neighbors said that he was a stylish man who drove a Mercedes S500 sports car and spoke Russian to his girlfriend.
Semenko was first noted by the FBI on June 5 when he used a computer in a restaurant to send encrypted messages presumably to a car parked in the restaurant lot that had Russian diplomatic plates and was parked for about 20 minutes, driven by a Russian official who was known to have transferred money to other Russian sleeper agents in 2004.
On or about June 26, 2010, Semenko met with an undercover FBI agent purporting to be a Russian agent and accepted $5,000, which he delivered to a drop site in Arlington, Virginia park. The drop was made at 11:06 am and Semenko was arrested at his residence in Arlington, Virginia, a suburb of Washington, DC later that day.
notice, police arrested the 55-year-old man at the Larnaca International Airport
as he was about to board a jet for Budapest
. He was released after posting €27,000 (equivalent to US$33,777) bail and told to report to a police station thereafter, but skipped out and apparently fled the country.
According to the information from US authorities shortly after his flight, "Metsos", who had traveled on a Canadian passport and claimed to be Canadian, had regularly travelled to the US to deliver money to his fellow Russian spies; he would typically drop off money at New York City area locations including a coffee shop, restaurant and subway station. According to his Cyprus lawyer, 'Metsos' had no discernible Russian accent and described himself as a Canadian resident who had divorced 15 years prior and had a son living in Paris.
On July 26, 2010, it was reported by the media that Passport Canada
, upon conducting a review, had revoked the travel document issued to Christopher Metsos.
Late in July 2010, Russian political commentator Yulia Latynina
voiced a theory that "Christopher Metsos" might have been a double agent and was probably now in the US; she did not cite any sources.
In the court verdict read in Moscow on June 27, 2011, it was claimed that the real name of the man who had posed as "Christopher Metsos" was Pavel Kapustin (Павел Капустин), a Russian espionage professional, who was exfiltrated upon being released on bail in Cyprus.
, who had been apprehended on June 28, 2010 in Seattle. He was charged with immigration violations and consented to deportation in lieu of further court proceedings; he was sent to Russia on July 13, 2010. Law enforcement officials said on the day of his deportation that Karetnikov had no direct ties to the other deported persons, although his name came up in the broader investigation.
On July 22, 2010, Newsweek published the comments of Karetnikov's fellow dorm resident, who said that Karetnikov had impressed him as "very oily" and "very Russian"; according to the anonymous source, Karetnikov spoke surprisingly poor English, but was "sophisticated" and knew a lot about Microsoft.
networks, flash memory sticks
, and text messages concealed in graphical images to exchange information. Custom steganographic
software developed in Moscow was used where concealed messages were inserted into otherwise innocuous files. This program was initiated by using the Control-Alt-E keys and entering a 27-character password, which the FBI found written down. Coded bursts of data sent by a shortwave radio transmitter were also used. Using invisible ink and exchanging identical bags in public places were also used.
Chapman used her laptop at a New York coffee shop on 47th Street in January 2010 and electronically transferred data to a Russian official driving by. Two months later, Chapman used a private Wi-Fi network, possibly at a Barnes and Noble store on Greenwich Street in New York, to communicate with the same Russian official, who was nearby. Chapman used a range extender for her laptop.
, section 371 to Magistrate Judge Hon. Ronald L. Ellis on June 27, 2010. The agent wrote that the violation consisted of "conspiracy to Act as Unregistered Agents of a Foreign Government".
As of July 6, 2010, The New York Times
reported that federal and local prosecutors were seeking a rapid conclusion to the case, avoiding a trial in which sensitive information relating to information-gathering techniques could be disclosed. The proposed deal would have the defendants deported to Russia after pleading guilty to lesser charges.
News of the spy swap was broken by Reuters
Moscow correspondent Guy Faulconbridge who reported on the morning of July 7 that Igor Sutyagin
, who had been jailed in 2004 for passing secrets to a British company that Russian prosecutors said was a front for the CIA, was to be swapped as part of a deal with the United States to bring home the Russian agents.
In a hearing held in federal court in Manhattan
on July 8, 2010, presided over by Judge Kimba Wood
, all 10 defendants pleaded guilty to a single charge each of secretly conspiring to act as agents of the Russian government. While the charge could carry up to five years in prison, The Washington Post described the pleas as a first step in what could be the largest prisoner swap between the United States and Russia since the days of the Cold War
. Under the plea agreements, the defendants also disclosed their true identities and all except for Vicky Peláez admitted that they were Russian citizens.
On July 9, 2010, Attorney General Eric Holder
said none of the 10 defendants had passed classified information and therefore none was charged with espionage.
All the defendants were sentenced to time already served and all their assets in the US seized. According to the NYT report after the swap was implemented, the deal had been struck by political leaders of the two nations even before an indictment was brought, with both the US prosecutors and the defendants' lawyers merely "window-dressing".
, Sergei Skripal
and Gennadiy Vasilenko were also included in the exchange. All of the four persons had served a considerable time in Russian prisons; at least three of the jailed individuals in Russia had been convicted of spying
for either the United Kingdom, or the US.
White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel
was reported on July 8, 2010, as saying that President Barack Obama
had approved the swap deal. An administration official was quoted as saying that Obama had not spoken to Russian President Dmitry Medvedev about the spy swap but had been "fully briefed and engaged in the matter." Broad agreement in the US was reported to exist that the agents were being deported swiftly as neither government wanted the case to damage attempts to reset their relationship.
Shortly before the swap deal was reached, nuclear specialist Igor Sutyagin
, one of the Russian prisoners included in the deal, had been moved to a Moscow prison from a facility near the Arctic Circle, and was then flown to Vienna
as part of the exchange between the two nations.
Under a U.S-Russian agreement, the Russian government has agreed to release the Russian prisoners and their family members for resettlement. The Russian prisoners have all served a number of years in prison and some are in poor health.
On July 9, 2010, the Russian ministry of Foreign Affairs has confirmed the exchange of four convicted people for ten Russian citizens citing "humanitarian considerations and constructive partnership development".
On July 9, 2010, all ten suspects were deported on a government-chartered jet from Vision Airlines
took off from New York's LaGuardia Airport
on July 8, carrying the ten Russian agents to Vienna International Airport
via Bangor, Maine
, for a refuelling and then for the swap around mid-day of July 9, 2010 (local time). Returning from Vienna were four Russian prisoners – Igor Sutyagin
, Alexander Zaporozhsky
, Sergei Skripal
, Gennady Vasilenko. The aircraft landed at RAF Brize Norton
in Oxfordshire, England, to drop two of the exchanged Russian nationals, then proceeded to Washington Dulles International Airport
on the afternoon of July 9, 2010. The Russian government Yakovlev Yak-42
jet returned to Moscow's Domodedovo airport where, after landing, the 10 spies were kept away from local and international press.
Igor Sutyagin
(Игорь Сутягин) was an arms control researcher with the Institute for US and Canadian Studies
(ISKAN) of the Russian Academy of Sciences
who had been arrested in 1999 and sentenced in April 2004 to 15 years hard labor on high treason charges. He had collected open-source data
on Russian nuclear submarines and missile warning systems, analysed and sold it to a British company that his prosecutors alleged was actually a cover for the US Central Intelligence Agency
. He steadfastly denied using any classified information and ISKAN is said to have no access to Russian classified materials. Although Igor Sutyagin had maintained his innocence throughout his conviction, he had to plead guilty shortly before the swap in order to qualify for a Presidential pardon. The U.S. Department of State and Amnesty International classified Sutyagin as a political prisoner, not a spy. The Washington Post commented that Sutyagin's case was different from the other released prisoners and that his original arrest might have been to warn Russians not to cooperate with Western companies and think tanks.
According to his relatives, Igor Sutyagin phoned home upon his arrival in the UK, saying that he had been placed at an undisclosed location in a London suburb, and that British authorities were in a process of granting him a UK visa. Later his lawyer confirmed that Sutyagin was granted a leave to remain in the UK.
(Сергей Скрипаль) was a colonel in Russia's Military Intelligence Service, who had been sentenced in 2006 to 13 years for spying for Britain. He had spied for Britain's MI5
intelligence agency in the late 1990s while serving in the Russian Ground Forces
, and had been paid to give away the identities of a number of Russian agents.
(Александр Запорожский) was an operative in Russia's Foreign Intelligence Service
who had been sentenced in 2003 to 18 years for secret cooperation with the United States. He was released as part of the swap after having served seven years.
, he fell under suspicion of being a double agent. Vasilenko was not convicted but instead sacked from the KGB force.
He was arrested in 2005 and charged with an attempted murder. Due to lack of evidence this charge was dropped; instead, he was sentenced to 3 years on possession of illegal firearms and explosive materials. In 2009, Vasilenko was convicted and sentenced again for allegedly having attempted to bribe facility officials.
According to media reports (which cite anonymous sources in Russian intelligence), Vasilenko was included in the list for the swap thanks to a personal request from the former CIA officer Jack Platt who had known him in the line of his CIA official duties (Vasilenko was posted in the U.S. under diplomatic cover from 1976 to 1981).
Six other individuals were considered for exchange as an even 11:11 swap, but were not exchanged in Vienna.
's White House visit, might cast a shadow over President Barack Obama
's effort to improve relations between the US and Russia, on June 30, 2010, the US administration said that it would not expel Russian diplomats and it expressed no indignation that Russia had apparently been caught spying on it.
On June 29, 2010, The Guardian
's comment said: "Revelations about spy rings are the last thing a politician like Medvedev, who presents himself as a moderniser, needs"; in its July 1, 2010, issue, The Economist
wrote: "The revelations have caused embarrassment in Moscow, not so much because Russia was caught spying on America, but because it did it so clumsily. Old KGB spies this week lamented the decline in professional standards. But the scandal has rather more serious domestic implications too. It punctures the mystique that helped allow the security services to gain such clout under Vladimir Putin
, Russia's former president and present prime minister and a former KGB spy. The story discredits him and his circle of silovik
i, the former and present members of the security services. Being laughed at is worse than being feared."
On February 1, 2011, the Republic of Ireland
's cabinet made a decision to expel a Russian diplomat from the country – the first time since 1983, after the Irish government, based on the Garda Síochána
's report, concluded that the Russian security agent based at the Russian embassy in Rathgar
had gathered details from six genuine Irish passports that were then effectively cloned in Russia for the US-based spies. Ireland's Department of Foreign Affairs
said, "The Government, by today’s action, has once again made clear that it will not tolerate the fabrication and use of forged Irish passports by agents of a foreign State." On February 4, 2011, the Irish press identified the expelled diplomat as Alexander Smirnov, first secretary in the Russian embassy’s consular section. On February 2, 2011, Russia threatened retaliation.
According to her lawyer, Vicky Peláez was placed in a Moscow apartment provided by Russian authorities. She turned down a 2000 USD per month offer from the Russian government and was planning to return to Peru.
On June 28, 2010, Anna Chapman's UK citizenship was revoked.
On July 13, 2010, Russian intelligence sources were quoted as saying that the deported Russian agents would undergo a rigorous series of tests, including a lie detector, to establish whether any of them had acted as a double agent.
The spy affair attracted media attention, including Chapman being described as "glamorous" and U.S. Vice President
Joe Biden
joking shortly after the swap on a television chat show to comedian Jay Leno
when asked "Do we have any spies that hot?" by saying "Let me be clear. It wasn't my idea to send her back." Joe Biden also said of the Russian agents: "And the ten, they've been here a long time, but they hadn't done much."
On July 24, 2010, in the Crimea
, Russian prime minister Vladimir Putin
told reporters, without specifying the date, that he had met with the agents, specifically acknowledging that Chapman was among them; he said that they had had "a tough life" and been turned in as a result of "betrayal"; he also sang with the agents to live music some songs, including "From Where the Motherland Begins" (What the Motherland Begins With or What Does the Motherland Start With). Putin declined to evaluate their work saying that it was not up to him to evaluate but up to specialists and the "ultimate consumers of the information of such type, the Supreme Commander – the president of the Russian Federation."
In mid-August 2010, Sir Stephen Lander
, Director-General of MI5
(1996–2002) voiced an opinion that the very existence of a ring of Russian "illegals" was no laughing matter: "The fact that they're nondescript or don't look serious is part of the charm of the business. That's why the Russians are so successful at some of this stuff. They're able to put people in those positions over time to build up their cover to be useful. They are part of a machine... And the machine is a very professional and serious one."
In October 2010, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev
recognized those "Intelligence agents who worked in the United States and returned to Russia in July" together with other members of the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service for their services to the motherland in ceremonies held at the Kremlin.
In November 2010, an unidentified Kremlin official told Kommersant that an assassination
plan for the alleged defector "Colonel Shcherbakov" was already in the works: "We know who he is and where he is"; the source added that "a Mercader" had been sent after Shcherbakov – a reference to assassin Ramón Mercader
who murdered Leon Trotsky
in Mexico with an ice axe in 1940. The newspaper article's author later said that the statement could have been made in jest ("spy humour"). On November 13, 2010, U.S. intelligence analyst David Wise suggested that, assuming Shcherbakov was in the US, he must be under FBI protection.
On November 17, 2010, the Interfax news agency cited an unidentified "Russian intelligence source" as saying that "Colonel Alexander Poteyev, a former deputy head of the U.S. division of Directorate S (illegal intelligence) within the SVR" was the subject of both internal and criminal investigations, with the criminal case likely to have been opened as per Article 275 of the RF Criminal Code (high treason). Poteyev's identity (full name: Александр Николаевич Потеев) was confirmed by other ex-KGB and ex-SVR sources. The revelations in the Russian media about the 'treachery' within the SVR were seen by commentators as a sign of an ongoing struggle within the RF top bureaucracy for control over the administratively autonomous agency that had been part of the USSR KGB
.
On December 1, 2010, commentator and researcher Bill Gertz
quoted a "former intelligence official close to the National Security Agency
" (NSA) as saying that the FBI and the NSA were conducting a counterintelligence probe at the NSA Fort Meade, Md., headquarters in a top-secret hunt for a Russian agent, believing that the spy ring was likely acting as conduits for information coming from "one or more Russian spies that NSA is convinced reside at Fort Meade and possibly other DoD
intel offices". Bill Gertz's report prompted the Russian intelligence expert Andrei Soldatov
to question the quasi-official version about Poteyev's responsibility. In a Larry King Live
interview, aired by CNN
about the same time, RF prime minister Putin maintained that the agents "deserved unconditional respect", "their activities had not done harm to U.S. interests" and that they would only become operational "in crisis periods, say, in case of a breakup of the diplomatic relations."
On December 16, 2010, prime minister Putin, when answering the question during a televised call-in show about whether he had ever signed assassination orders, said that hit squads had long been abolished in Russia; speaking specifically of the turncoat allegedly responsible for exposing the 10 sleeper agents, he denounced him as a "brute" and a "pig" saying that "the traitors will croak all by themselves".
On May 3, 2011, in Moscow, Alexander Poteyev was indicted on high treason and desertion charges and later put on trial in absentia
. On 27 June 2011, he was found guilty in absentia on both charges and convicted to 25 years of imprisonment; the judge's verdict said that Poteyev had been recruited to the CIA in 1999. His court-appointed advocate said that Poteyev's remuneration
from the US government might have reached $55 million.
News media
United States Department of Justice
The United States Department of Justice , is the United States federal executive department responsible for the enforcement of the law and administration of justice, equivalent to the justice or interior ministries of other countries.The Department is led by the Attorney General, who is nominated...
, was a network of Russian sleeper agent
Sleeper agent
A sleeper agent is a spy who is placed in a target country or organization, not to undertake an immediate mission, but rather to act as a potential asset if activated...
s under non-official cover
Non-official cover
Non-official cover is a term used in espionage, particularly by national intelligence services, for agents or operatives who assume covert roles in organizations without ties to the government for which they work. Such agents or operatives are typically abbreviated in espionage lingo as a NOC...
whose investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation
Federal Bureau of Investigation
The Federal Bureau of Investigation is an agency of the United States Department of Justice that serves as both a federal criminal investigative body and an internal intelligence agency . The FBI has investigative jurisdiction over violations of more than 200 categories of federal crime...
(FBI) culminated in the arrest of ten agents and a prisoner swap
Prisoner exchange
A prisoner exchange or prisoner swap is a deal between opposing sides in a conflict to release prisoners. These may be prisoners of war, spies, hostages, etc...
between Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
and the United States on July 9, 2010.
The spies were planted in the United States by the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service
Foreign Intelligence Service (Russia)
The Russian Foreign Intelligence Service is Russia's primary external intelligence agency. The SVR is the successor of the First Chief Directorate of the KGB since December 1991...
(known by its Russian
Russian language
Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...
abbreviation, SVR), and were the target of a multi-year investigation by the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation
Federal Bureau of Investigation
The Federal Bureau of Investigation is an agency of the United States Department of Justice that serves as both a federal criminal investigative body and an internal intelligence agency . The FBI has investigative jurisdiction over violations of more than 200 categories of federal crime...
. The FBI investigation, called Operation Ghost Stories, culminated at the end of June 2010 with the arrest of 10 individuals in the U.S. and an eleventh suspect in Cyprus
Cyprus
Cyprus , officially the Republic of Cyprus , is a Eurasian island country, member of the European Union, in the Eastern Mediterranean, east of Greece, south of Turkey, west of Syria and north of Egypt. It is the third largest island in the Mediterranean Sea.The earliest known human activity on the...
. Ten sleeper agents were charged with "carrying out long-term, 'deep-cover' assignments in the United States on behalf of the Russian Federation."
The suspect arrested in Cyprus skipped bail
Jump bail
To jump bail, or skip bail, is a legal idiom in which a person who has posted bail and been released on bail subsequently fails to appear in criminal court with the intention of avoiding prosecution, sentencing or imprisonment...
the day after his arrest. A twelfth person, a Russian national who had worked for Microsoft
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
, was also apprehended about the same time and deported
Deportation
Deportation means the expulsion of a person or group of people from a place or country. Today it often refers to the expulsion of foreign nationals whereas the expulsion of nationals is called banishment, exile, or penal transportation...
on July 13, 2010. The Moscow legal court documents made public on June 27, 2011, revealed that another two Russian agents had managed to flee the U.S. without being arrested.
Ten of the agents were flown on July 9, 2010, to Vienna
Vienna
Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
soon after pleading guilty to charges of failing to register as a representative of a foreign government. The same day, the agents were exchanged for four Russian nationals, three of whom had been convicted and imprisoned by Russia on espionage (high treason
High treason
High treason is criminal disloyalty to one's government. Participating in a war against one's native country, attempting to overthrow its government, spying on its military, its diplomats, or its secret services for a hostile and foreign power, or attempting to kill its head of state are perhaps...
) charges.
On October 31, 2011, the FBI publicly released several dozen still images, clips from surveillance video, and documents related to its investigation in response to Freedom of Information Act
Freedom of Information Act (United States)
The Freedom of Information Act is a federal freedom of information law that allows for the full or partial disclosure of previously unreleased information and documents controlled by the United States government. The Act defines agency records subject to disclosure, outlines mandatory disclosure...
requests.
FBI arrests and criminal charges
Using forged documents, some of the spies had assumed stolen identities of Americans, enrolled at American universities and joined professional organizations as a means of further infiltrating spies into government circles. Two of the individuals used the names of Richard and Cynthia Murphy and resided in Hoboken, New JerseyHoboken, New Jersey
Hoboken is a city in Hudson County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2010 United States Census, the city's population was 50,005. The city is part of the New York metropolitan area and contains Hoboken Terminal, a major transportation hub for the region...
, since the mid-1990s, before purchasing a nearby home in suburban Montclair
Montclair, New Jersey
-Demographics:As of the census of 2000, there were 38,977 people, 15,020 households, and 9,687 families residing in the township. The population density was 6,183.6 people per square mile . There were 15,531 housing units at an average density of 2,464.0 per square mile...
. Another couple named in court documents were journalist Vicky Peláez
Vicky Peláez
Virginia "Vicky" Peláez Ocampo is a Peruvian journalist and columnist, currently for The Moscow News newspaper. She is known for her leftist writings in El Diario La Prensa, a New York City Spanish language newspaper...
and a man using the name of Juan Lazaro in Yonkers, New York
Yonkers, New York
Yonkers is the fourth most populous city in the state of New York , and the most populous city in Westchester County, with a population of 195,976...
. The court filings allege that couples had been arranged in Russia to "co-habit in the country to which they are assigned", going as far as having children together to help maintain their deep covert status.
The criminal complaints later filed in various federal district courts
United States district court
The United States district courts are the general trial courts of the United States federal court system. Both civil and criminal cases are filed in the district court, which is a court of law, equity, and admiralty. There is a United States bankruptcy court associated with each United States...
allege that the Russian agents in the U.S. passed information back to the SVR by messages hidden
Steganography
Steganography is the art and science of writing hidden messages in such a way that no one, apart from the sender and intended recipient, suspects the existence of the message, a form of security through obscurity...
inside digital photographs, written in disappearing ink, ad hoc wireless networks and shortwave radio transmissions, as well as by agents swapping identical bags while passing each other in the stairwell of a train station. Messages and materials were passed in such places as Grand Central Terminal
Grand Central Terminal
Grand Central Terminal —often incorrectly called Grand Central Station, or shortened to simply Grand Central—is a terminal station at 42nd Street and Park Avenue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, United States...
and Central Park
Central Park
Central Park is a public park in the center of Manhattan in New York City, United States. The park initially opened in 1857, on of city-owned land. In 1858, Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux won a design competition to improve and expand the park with a plan they entitled the Greensward Plan...
.
The Russian agents were tasked by 'Moscow center' to report about U.S. policy in Central America, U.S. interpretation of Russian foreign policy, problems with U.S. military policy and "United States policy with regard to the use of the Internet by terrorists".
According to the media reports, planning by the FBI to have the 'illegals' arrested had begun in mid-June 2010, but the action was hastened reportedly by some members of the group intending to travel outside the U.S. as well as by Anna Chapman's growing concern about having been exposed. Vladimir Guriyev was planning to travel to France and possibly Russia, Bezrukov was planning to travel outside the U.S. with his son, and Anna Chapman, in a telephone call to her father the day before the arrest, was suspicious that she may have been discovered to be an agent and was planning to leave for Moscow in mid-July 2010.
Ten of the agents involved were arrested by U.S. authorities on June 27, 2010, in a series of raids in Boston
Boston
Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...
, Montclair, Yonkers and Northern Virginia
Northern Virginia
Northern Virginia consists of several counties and independent cities in the Commonwealth of Virginia, in a widespread region generally radiating southerly and westward from Washington, D.C...
. The individuals were charged with money laundering
Money laundering
Money laundering is the process of disguising illegal sources of money so that it looks like it came from legal sources. The methods by which money may be laundered are varied and can range in sophistication. Many regulatory and governmental authorities quote estimates each year for the amount...
(which can carry a penalty of up to 20 years' imprisonment) and failing to register as agents of a foreign government. No charges were offered that the individuals involved had gained access to classified material, though contacts had been made with a former intelligence official and with a scientist involved in developing bunker buster
Bunker buster
A bunker buster is a bomb designed to penetrate hardened targets or targets buried deep underground.-Germany:Röchling shells were bunker-busting artillery shells, developed by German engineer August Cönders, based on the theory of increasing sectional density to improve penetration.They were tested...
bombs.
One of the suspects using the name of Christopher R. Metsos was detained on June 29, 2010 while attempting to depart from Cyprus for Budapest
Budapest
Budapest is the capital of Hungary. As the largest city of Hungary, it is the country's principal political, cultural, commercial, industrial, and transportation centre. In 2011, Budapest had 1,733,685 inhabitants, down from its 1989 peak of 2,113,645 due to suburbanization. The Budapest Commuter...
, but was released on bail and then disappeared.
There is no evidence that the convicted agents knew each other beyond their respective spouses; they did not constitute any 'spy ring'.
Shortly after the arrests, the British Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
commented: "The FBI operation represents the biggest penetration of the SVR communications in recent memory. The FBI read their emails, decrypted their intel, read the embedded coded texts on images posted on the net, bugged their mobile phones, videotaped the passing of bags of cash and messages in invisible ink from one agent to another, and hacked into their bogus expenses claims. <...> The tradecraft used by the alleged SVR ring was amateurish, and will send shivers down the spine of the rival intelligence organisations in Russia. This was bungling on a truly epic scale. No secrets about bunker-busting bombs were actually obtained, but the network was betrayed. <...> To have a spy ring uncovered before they could actually do any serious spying is doubly embarrassing."
Coinciding with the day of the prisoners' swap, the death of the prominent Russian defector Sergei Tretyakov
Sergei Tretyakov (intelligence officer)
Colonel Sergei Tretyakov was a Russian SVR officer who defected to the United States in October 2000.-Biography:...
who had died in the US on June 13, 2010, was reported on July 9, 2010; the Florida medical examiner's report released on September 20, 2010, cited an accident and a tumour as the cause of death. In response to allegations in the media that he might have tipped off the US authorities about some of the 'illegals', Tretyakov's co-author Pete Earley
Pete Earley
-Career:A former Washington Post reporter, he is the author of books about the Aldrich Ames and John Walker espionage cases. His book Circumstantial Evidence: Death, Life, and Justice in a Southern Town. won an Edgar Award from the Mystery Writers of America for Best Fact Crime Book in 1996. This...
in July 2010, citing anonymous "well-informed" sources, said that Tretyakov had not been privy to the case of Russian 'illegals'.
November 11, 2010, issue of Kommersant
Kommersant
Kommersant is a commerce-oriented newspaper published in Russia. , the circulation was 131,000.- History :The newspaper was initially published in 1909, and it was closed down following the Bolshevik seizure of power and the introduction of censorship in 1917.In 1989, with the onset of press...
, Russia's broadsheet, carried an article that, with reference to unnamed RF government sources, contained allegations that the 'illegals' had been fingered by a senior SVR officer named "Colonel Shcherbakov (Щербаков)" (according to an unnamed ex-CIA source, his full name may be Александр Васильевич Щербаков); the latter had, according to the newspaper's sources, headed the 'American' unit of the SVR department in charge of 'illegals' and left Russia for the US "three days prior to Dmitry Medvedev
Dmitry Medvedev
Dmitry Anatolyevich Medvedev is the third President of the Russian Federation.Born to a family of academics, Medvedev graduated from the Law Department of Leningrad State University in 1987. He defended his dissertation in 1990 and worked as a docent at his alma mater, now renamed to Saint...
's June visit to the US". According to other media outlets' sources, the name "Shcherbakov" was fictitious and a number of allegations made in the article were judged by experts and commentators to be either highly dubious or improbable; nevertheless, some comments made the following day by RF President Medvedev were interpreted as an indirect confirmation of the fact of a high-level defection in the RF intelligence apparatus. On November 15, 2010, Interfax citing unnamed sources within Russian intelligence claimed that the real name of the defector who was primarily responsible for uncovering the 10 convicted agents was Poteyev (reportedly, his full name is Александр Николаевич Потеев), who had a rank of Colonel in the SVR and had been deputy head of American department within Directorate 'S' of SVR ('S' oversees illegals). According to Interfax and other media sources, Shcherbakov did exist and also had held a senior position in the SVR; reportedly, he "had defected about two years ago".
Anna Chapman
Anna ChapmanAnna Chapman
Anna Vasil’yevna Chapman is a Russian national, who was living in New York, United States when she was arrested along with nine others on 27 June 2010, on suspicion of working for the Illegals Program spy ring under the Russian Federation's external intelligence agency, the SVR...
, maiden name Anna Vasil'evna Kushchenko (Анна Васильевна Кущенко), whose former name according to U.S. authorities is "Anya Kushchenko", is a Volgograd
Volgograd
Volgograd , formerly called Tsaritsyn and Stalingrad is an important industrial city and the administrative center of Volgograd Oblast, Russia. It is long, north to south, situated on the western bank of the Volga River...
native (was born in Ukraine, according to some reports. Her father was employed in the Russian embassy in Nairobi, Kenya. She received her master's in economics degree from the Peoples' Friendship University of Russia
Peoples' Friendship University of Russia
The Peoples' Friendship University of Russia is an educational and research institution located in the South of Moscow and is ranked by the Ministry of Education of Russia as the country's third-best university after Moscow State University and Saint Petersburg State University...
in Moscow. She later worked in London at NetJets
NetJets
NetJets, a subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway, offers fractional ownership and rental of private business jets.-History:NetJets Inc., formerly Executive Jet Aviation, was founded in 1964 as one of the first private business jet charter and aircraft management companies...
, Barclays Bank and allegedly at a few other companies for brief periods. In 2001, at an underground rave party in London's Docklands, she met Alex Chapman, the son of a British business executive, whom she married shortly thereafter in Moscow; they divorced in 2006. On July 2, 2010, Alex Chapman's revelations were made public; among other things, he claimed that he was not surprised by her arrest and that his ex-wife had "held secret meetings with Russian 'friends'".
The India One reports that Chapman may have been recruited to become an agent when she was in the United Kingdom citing Oleg Gordievsky and Alex Chapman as sources. An urgent probe is underway in the UK to ascertain whether Chapman organized sleeper cells in the United Kingdom.
Her LinkedIn
LinkedIn
LinkedIn is a business-related social networking site. Founded in December 2002 and launched in May 2003, it is mainly used for professional networking. , LinkedIn reports more than 120 million registered users in more than 200 countries and territories. The site is available in English, French,...
social networking site profile identified herself as CEO of PropertyFinder Ltd, a website selling real estate
Real estate
In general use, esp. North American, 'real estate' is taken to mean "Property consisting of land and the buildings on it, along with its natural resources such as crops, minerals, or water; immovable property of this nature; an interest vested in this; an item of real property; buildings or...
internationally. Chapman posted photos of herself on the Odnoklassniki ("Classmates") social networking website in Russia where she stated "Russia, Moscow. My favorite place on earth, my native capital!". She also posted photos and profiles on the Facebook
Facebook
Facebook is a social networking service and website launched in February 2004, operated and privately owned by Facebook, Inc. , Facebook has more than 800 million active users. Users must register before using the site, after which they may create a personal profile, add other users as...
and LinkedIn social networking websites.
Chapman's prior meetings with her Russian handlers had been on Wednesdays, not face to face, solely to pass information via encrypted private computer networks at Barnes & Noble
Barnes & Noble
Barnes & Noble, Inc. is the largest book retailer in the United States, operating mainly through its Barnes & Noble Booksellers chain of bookstores headquartered at 122 Fifth Avenue in the Flatiron District in Manhattan in New York City. Barnes & Noble also operated the chain of small B. Dalton...
or at Starbucks
Starbucks
Starbucks Corporation is an international coffee and coffeehouse chain based in Seattle, Washington. Starbucks is the largest coffeehouse company in the world, with 17,009 stores in 55 countries, including over 11,000 in the United States, over 1,000 in Canada, over 700 in the United Kingdom, and...
. Thus her suspicion was aroused when an FBI informant, posing as a Russian consular officer named "Roman", on Saturday, June 26, asked her to come to New York from Connecticut, where she was spending the weekend. Her suspicions increased when "Roman" was a different person than she knew. The task of a face-to-face transfer of a U.S. passport to another Russian agent was beyond the tasks that Moscow Center had previously assigned to her. After the meeting with "Roman", Chapman bought a new cell phone and two telephone cards. She called her father in Moscow and another individual in New York, both advising her not to transfer the passport; the calls were monitored by the FBI. Many former agents have publicly said that some of the slip-ups exposed by the FBI were downright humiliating. In perhaps the most famous example, Chapman registered the cellphone using a fictitious name and address (99 Fake Street) and the FBI retrieved the receipt, which Chapman had thrown away in a public garbage bin.
Chapman turned in the passport to the 1st Precinct police station in New York but was questioned by the FBI and arrested.
According to her American lawyer Robert Baum, when in the U.S. jail, she feared that she would be deported; when her deportation became imminent, she said she would go to live in London on her UK passport (which was subsequently revoked
Revocation
Revocation is the act of recall or annulment. It is the reversal of an act, the recalling of a grant, or the making void of some deed previously existing.-Contract law:...
, however). After her deportation to Russia, in July 2010, Robert Baum reiterated that his client had wished to stay in the US; he also said that she was "particularly upset" by the revocation of her UK citizenship and exclusion from the country.
Britain's tabloid Sunday Express
Daily Express
The Daily Express switched from broadsheet to tabloid in 1977 and was bought by the construction company Trafalgar House in the same year. Its publishing company, Beaverbrook Newspapers, was renamed Express Newspapers...
on August 8, 2010, cited an unidentified "source close to MI6" as saying: "There was a deal on the table just before she caught her connecting flight to Moscow. The secret service intercepted her on her flight back from America to Vienna, where her plane landed to refuel. MI6 were keen to know about other ‘illegals’ – Russian spy cells – hiding in Britain, so they made her an offer. In return they offered to give her back British citizenship and allow her to settle in London. Anna was having none of it though and told them in no uncertain terms that she wished to return to Russia."
In September German magazine Der Spiegel
Der Spiegel
Der Spiegel is a German weekly news magazine published in Hamburg. It is one of Europe's largest publications of its kind, with a weekly circulation of more than one million.-Overview:...
reported that Chapman said she had been forbidden by the SVR from saying anything on her activities in the US.
Mikhail Anatolyevich Vasenkov (Juan Lazaro) and Vicky Peláez
Vicky PeláezVicky Peláez
Virginia "Vicky" Peláez Ocampo is a Peruvian journalist and columnist, currently for The Moscow News newspaper. She is known for her leftist writings in El Diario La Prensa, a New York City Spanish language newspaper...
, a Peru
Peru
Peru , officially the Republic of Peru , is a country in western South America. It is bordered on the north by Ecuador and Colombia, on the east by Brazil, on the southeast by Bolivia, on the south by Chile, and on the west by the Pacific Ocean....
vian national and U.S. citizen, and Mikhail Anatolyevich Vasenkov (Михаил Анатольевич Васенков, alias Juan Lazaro), a Russian citizen, were arrested at their home in Yonkers, New York
Yonkers, New York
Yonkers is the fourth most populous city in the state of New York , and the most populous city in Westchester County, with a population of 195,976...
. Both admitted being Russian agents. The couple have a son together, and Peláez also has a son from a previous marriage. According to a report by The Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal is an American English-language international daily newspaper. It is published in New York City by Dow Jones & Company, a division of News Corporation, along with the Asian and European editions of the Journal....
in early August 2010, the real Juan Lazaro died of respiratory failure in 1947 in Uruguay
Uruguay
Uruguay ,officially the Oriental Republic of Uruguay,sometimes the Eastern Republic of Uruguay; ) is a country in the southeastern part of South America. It is home to some 3.5 million people, of whom 1.8 million live in the capital Montevideo and its metropolitan area...
at age 3, with Vasenkov having presumably used the dead toddler's birth certificate to build a persona. According to a file kept by the Peruvian Interior Ministry
Ministry of the Interior (Peru)
The Ministry of the Interior of Peru is charged with administrating the interior government of Peru as well managing National Police of Peru. The present minister is Oscar Valdés Dancuart.-Functions:...
that The WSJ cited, Vasenkov flew on March 13, 1976, from Madrid
Madrid
Madrid is the capital and largest city of Spain. The population of the city is roughly 3.3 million and the entire population of the Madrid metropolitan area is calculated to be 6.271 million. It is the third largest city in the European Union, after London and Berlin, and its metropolitan...
to Lima
Lima
Lima is the capital and the largest city of Peru. It is located in the valleys of the Chillón, Rímac and Lurín rivers, in the central part of the country, on a desert coast overlooking the Pacific Ocean. Together with the seaport of Callao, it forms a contiguous urban area known as the Lima...
on a Uruguayan passport in the name of Juan Jose Lazaro Fuentes; he bore a letter on a Spanish tobacco company's stationery saying he had been hired for a market survey in Peru; two years later, he submitted copies of the passport and a 1943 Uruguayan birth certificate with a letter asking Peru's military dictator Francisco Morales Bermúdez
Francisco Morales Bermúdez
Francisco Morales Bermúdez Cerruti is a Peruvian general who came to power in Peru in 1975 after deposing his predecessor, General Juan Velasco. His grandfather and all his original family were from the old Peruvian department of Tarapacá, which is now part of the Chilean territory...
(the country was then run by a US-friendly junta) for Peruvian citizenship which was granted in 1979.
"Juan Lazaro" was described as a "journalist and anthropologist" in the book Women and Revolution: Global Expression, for which he was a contributing author. Vasenkov had studied at the New School for Social Research and taught a class on Latin American and Caribbean Politics at Baruch College
Baruch College
Bernard M. Baruch College, more commonly known as Baruch College, is a constituent college of the City University of New York, located in the Flatiron district of Manhattan, New York City. With an acceptance rate of just 23%, Baruch is among the most competitive and diverse colleges in the nation...
for one semester during the 2008–2009 school year as an adjunct professor. According to The New York Times June 29, 2010, report, Vasenkov had been a vocal opponent of American foreign policy in class: "He maintained that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were a money-making ploy for corporate America. He praised President Hugo Chávez
Hugo Chávez
Hugo Rafael Chávez Frías is the 56th and current President of Venezuela, having held that position since 1999. He was formerly the leader of the Fifth Republic Movement political party from its foundation in 1997 until 2007, when he became the leader of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela...
of Venezuela and disparaged President Álvaro Uribe
Álvaro Uribe
Alvaro Uribe Vélez was the 58th President of Colombia, from 2002 to 2010. In August 2010 he was appointed Vice-chairman of the UN panel investigating the Gaza flotilla raid....
of Colombia as a pawn for paramilitary groups that have broad control over drug trafficking." At least one student complained about Vasenkov's teaching and he was let go at the end of the semester. The department chairman reported that Vasenkov's instruction was not up to standard resulting in his teaching for only one semester but that he recalled no controversy over any anti-American views.
In 1983, "Juan Lazaro" married Vicky Peláez; two years later they moved to New York with her son from a previous relationship.
Peláez had been a television reporter in Peru and a columnist at El Diario La Prensa
El Diario La Prensa
El Diario la Prensa is the largest and oldest Spanish-language daily newspaper in New York City, and the oldest Spanish-language daily in the United States. Published by ImpreMedia, the paper covers local, national and international news with an emphasis on Latin America, as well as human-interest...
in New York City. In her writings, Peláez was often critical of U.S. policy in Latin America and had supported liberation movements in those countries. In 1984, she had been kidnapped by the Túpac Amaru Revolutionary Movement
Túpac Amaru Revolutionary Movement
The Túpac Amaru Revolutionary Movement was a Marxist revolutionary group active in Peru from the early 1980s to 1997 and one of the main actors in the internal conflict in Peru...
who demanded that a video of their views be broadcast on television in exchange for her release, though a cameraman who was also kidnapped claimed that Peláez had been a willing participant in the kidnapping. Vasenkov wrote a 1990 article for a European publication that spoke "glowingly" of the Shining Path
Shining Path
Shining Path is a Maoist guerrilla terrorist organization in Peru. The group never refers to itself as "Shining Path", and as several other Peruvian groups, prefers to be called the "Communist Party of Peru" or "PCP-SL" in short...
guerrilla movement.
U.S. officials reported that on June 27, 2010, Vasenkov confessed to being a spy and that "Juan Lazaro" was not his real name, though he declined to give his true identity. He additionally stated he was not originally born in Uruguay, and that Peláez had delivered letters to Russian authorities on his behalf. It was later reported that Lazaro's real name is Mikhail Vasenkov. In November 2010, Russian Kommersant
Kommersant
Kommersant is a commerce-oriented newspaper published in Russia. , the circulation was 131,000.- History :The newspaper was initially published in 1909, and it was closed down following the Bolshevik seizure of power and the introduction of censorship in 1917.In 1989, with the onset of press...
published Russian anonymous sources' allegations that while in US custody, Vasenkov had had three ribs and a leg broken by investigators trying to extract more information from him – a claim assessed by experts as utterly improbable; the Kommersant article also cited unnamed RF government sources as saying that Vasenkov had been presented with the SVR personal file on him obtained through a senior SVR defector ("Colonel Shcherbakov"), whereafter he was forced to own up to his real name.
On August 7, 2010, The Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal is an American English-language international daily newspaper. It is published in New York City by Dow Jones & Company, a division of News Corporation, along with the Asian and European editions of the Journal....
cited Vasenkov's American lawyer, Genesis Peduto, as saying that his client had indicated to her on the phone that he wanted to leave Moscow for Peru: "He doesn't want to stay in Russia. He says he's Juan Lazaro and he's not from Russia and doesn't speak Russian. He wants to be where his wife is going, to her native country, where it will be easier for Juan Jr. to visit. His family comes first." Boris Volodarsky tentatively suggested that Vasenkov's mother could have been from Spain and emigrated to the USSR in the wake of Spanish Civil War
Spanish Civil War
The Spanish Civil WarAlso known as The Crusade among Nationalists, the Fourth Carlist War among Carlists, and The Rebellion or Uprising among Republicans. was a major conflict fought in Spain from 17 July 1936 to 1 April 1939...
(1936–1939).
Andrey Bezrukov and Yelena Vavilova (Donald Heathfield and Tracey Lee Ann Foley)
Andrey Bezrukov (Андрей Безруков, alias Donald Howard Heathfield) and Yelena Vavilova (Елена Вавилова, alias Tracey Lee Ann Foley) admitted being both Russian citizens and Russian agents. The agents have two sons, aged 16 and 20 at the time of their parents' arrest.Bezrukov and his cover wife Yelena Vavilova had a home in Cambridge, Massachusetts
Cambridge, Massachusetts
Cambridge is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States, in the Greater Boston area. It was named in honor of the University of Cambridge in England, an important center of the Puritan theology embraced by the town's founders. Cambridge is home to two of the world's most prominent...
. Heathfield had earned an M.P.A.
Master of Public Administration
The Master of Public Administration is a professional post-graduate degree in Public Administration. The MPA program prepares individuals to serve as managers in the executive arm of local, state/provincial, and federal/national government, and increasingly in nongovernmental organization and...
degree from the John F. Kennedy School of Government
John F. Kennedy School of Government
The John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University is a public policy and public administration school, and one of Harvard's graduate and professional schools...
at Harvard University
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...
, where he was described as a "joiner". Heathfield claimed to have been the son of a Canadian diplomat and to have studied at a school in the Czech Republic. A fellow graduate of the Kennedy School noted that Heathfield kept careful track of his nearly 200 classmates, who included President of Mexico Felipe Calderón
Felipe Calderón
Felipe de Jesús Calderón Hinojosa is the current President of Mexico. He assumed office on December 1, 2006, and was elected for a single six-year term through 2012...
. In 2010, Harvard Kennedy School stripped Heathfield/Bezrukov of his degree.
Bezrukov was a professional member of the World Future Society
World Future Society
The World Future Society is a nonprofit educational and scientific organization in Bethesda, Maryland, US, founded in 1966.The Society investigates how social, economic and technological developments are shaping the future...
, described by the Boston Herald
Boston Herald
The Boston Herald is a daily newspaper that serves Boston, Massachusetts, United States, and its surrounding area. It was started in 1846 and is one of the oldest daily newspapers in the United States...
as "a think tank on future technologies that holds conferences featuring top government scientists". Former Al Gore National Security Advisor Leon Fuerth
Leon Fuerth
Leon Sigmund Fuerth is a former diplomat who served as national security adviser to former U.S. Vice President Al Gore. He was succeeded in that capacity by I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby in January 2001...
spoke at the World Future Society 2008 conference in Washington, DC. along with George Washington University professor William Halal. In a July 2, 2010, Wall Street Journal article, Fuerth is quoted acknowledging he met Heathfield after a speech he gave. In the same article, Halal described his relationship to Heathfield as benign; "I would bump into him at meetings of Federal agencies, think tanks, and the World Future Society. I have no information that's of any security value ... Everything I gave Don was published widely and readily available on the Internet". Bezrukov was Chief executive of Future Map, a Cambridge consulting company involved in government and corporate preparedness systems.
Bezrukov's cover wife, Yelena Vavilova, worked for Redfin, a real estate firm in Somerville, Massachusetts
Somerville, Massachusetts
Somerville is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States, located just north of Boston. As of the 2010 census, the city had a total population of 75,754 and was the most densely populated municipality in New England. It is also the 17th most densely populated incorporated place in...
; she claimed to be from Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
but also travelled on British passport
British passport
British passports may be issued to people holding any of the various forms of British nationality, and are used as evidence of the bearer's nationality and immigration status within the United Kingdom or the issuing state/territory.-Issuing:...
.
On July 16, 2010, Harvard University revoked Bezrukov's degree in public administration on the grounds of misrepresentation of the identity in his application.
Vladimir and Lidiya Guryev (Richard and Cynthia Murphy)
Vladimir Guryev (Владимир Гурьев, alias Richard Murphy) and Lidiya Guriyeva (Лидия Гурьева, alias Cynthia Murphy) were Russian agents in New Jersey.Lidiya Guryev had attended school in the United States receiving two undergraduate degrees from New York University
New York University
New York University is a private, nonsectarian research university based in New York City. NYU's main campus is situated in the Greenwich Village section of Manhattan...
and an MBA from Columbia Business School
Columbia Business School
Columbia Business School is the business school of Columbia University in Manhattan, New York City. It was established in 1916 to provide business training and professional preparation for undergraduate and graduate Columbia University students...
. In 2009, Cynthia Murphy developed contacts in New York City financial circles as a means to obtain details about the global gold market. Lidiya had been trying to cultivate a relationship with Alan Patricof
Alan Patricof
Alan Patricof is an American investor and one of the early pioneers of the venture capital and private equity industries. Patricof founded Apax Partners , which is today one of the largest private equity firms globally.-Career:Over the course of his 40-year career in...
, a venture capitalist who co-chaired Hillary Clinton's 2008 presidential bid, with her handlers telling her to "to try to build up little by little relations". Lidiya Guriyev was Vice president of Morea Financial Services in New York.
Vladimir Guryev supplied money and equipment to Kutsik (see below) in a 2004 meeting in Columbus Circle, New York and 2009, where $150,000 and a flash drive was given. When the computer program was inoperative, Guriyev supplied Kutsik with a laptop computer that Guriyev brought from Moscow.
Vladimir and Lidiya Guryev were arrested at their home in Montclair, New Jersey
Montclair, New Jersey
-Demographics:As of the census of 2000, there were 38,977 people, 15,020 households, and 9,687 families residing in the township. The population density was 6,183.6 people per square mile . There were 15,531 housing units at an average density of 2,464.0 per square mile...
. The couple have two young daughters, aged 11 and 9 at the time of their parents' arrest. Vladimir Guriyev used a false birth certificate
Birth certificate
A birth certificate is a vital record that documents the birth of a child. The term "birth certificate" can refer to either the original document certifying the circumstances of the birth or to a certified copy of or representation of the ensuing registration of that birth...
that claimed he had been born in Philadelphia, while his wife said that she had been born in New York City as "Cynthia A. Hopkins". The two had earlier lived in an apartment in Hoboken
Hoboken, New Jersey
Hoboken is a city in Hudson County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2010 United States Census, the city's population was 50,005. The city is part of the New York metropolitan area and contains Hoboken Terminal, a major transportation hub for the region...
since arriving in the United States in the mid-1990s. They then purchased a suburban Montclair home for $481,000 in 2008. When they purchased it, the couple argued with their handlers as to who would officially own the house, with the ultimate decision being that it would be owned by "Moscow Center".
Professor Nina Khrushcheva, who had served as Vladimir's faculty adviser at The New School
The New School
The New School is a university in New York City, located mostly in Greenwich Village. From its founding in 1919 by progressive New York academics, and for most of its history, the university was known as the New School for Social Research. Between 1997 and 2005 it was known as New School University...
for three years starting in 2002, said in July 2010 that she had found it difficult to figure out a purported Philadelphia native: "I was always puzzled by the inconsistency between a completely American name and a completely Russian behaviour <...> He had a thick Russian accent and an incredibly unhappy Russian personality."
Vladimir Guryev was criticized by his wife for his poor information gathering and suggested that he pursue individuals with connections to the White House. The couple had also been tasked with obtaining information about U.S. policy in Afghanistan
Afghanistan
Afghanistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located in the centre of Asia, forming South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East. With a population of about 29 million, it has an area of , making it the 42nd most populous and 41st largest nation in the world...
, the nuclear program of Iran
Nuclear program of Iran
The nuclear program of Iran was launched in the 1950s with the help of the United States as part of the Atoms for Peace program. The support, encouragement and participation of the United States and Western European governments in Iran's nuclear program continued until the 1979 Iranian Revolution...
and the latest Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty talks
New START
New START is a nuclear arms reduction treaty between the United States of America and the Russian Federation with the formal name of Measures for the Further Reduction and Limitation of Strategic Offensive Arms...
. Shortly after the couple's arrest, one of their neighbors quipped: "They couldn't be spies. Look what she did with the hydrangeas."
Mikhail Kutsik and Nataliya Pereverzeva (Michael Zottoli and Patricia Mills)
Mikhail Kutsik (Михаил Куцик; cover name Michael Zottoli) and Natalya Pereverzeva (Наталья Переверзева; cover name Patricia Mills) were agents in Seattle, later Arlington, Virginia. They appear to be in their 40s. Kutsik came to the US in 2001, and Pereverzeva came in 2003, according to the FBI. He claimed to be American but had a thick accent, and she claimed to be Canadian, but neighbors said she sounded YugoslaviaYugoslavia
Yugoslavia refers to three political entities that existed successively on the western part of the Balkans during most of the 20th century....
n. They lived in the Seattle, Washington, area for about two years, and both attended the University of Washington, Bothell
University of Washington, Bothell
The University of Washington Bothell is a four-year undergraduate and graduate campus in northeast King County, one of the three campuses of the public University of Washington...
, where they earned bachelor's degrees in business. Zottoli worked for several different jobs over the years including telecom company accountant, car salesman and teleconference firm employee. Pereverzeva was a stay-at-home mom who cared for their toddler son named Kenny, and a second son was born in late 2009. After Kutsik lost his job in 2009, they moved with their children to Arlington, Virginia, later that year. After their parents were arrested, arrangements were made to send the children to Russia.
Kutsik and Pereverzeva pled guilty to "conspiring to act as an unregistered agent of a foreign country." They appeared to be an ordinary married couple with two young children. However US authorities allege that they had both been spying for Russia in the US since at least 2004. They received specially coded radio transmissions from their high-rise Seattle apartment, and the FBI secretly entered their home where they found random numbers used to decode the "radiograms". Kutsik received money from Guriyev (Murphy) in Columbus Circle, New York in 2004 while Pereverzeva stood as lookout. In 2006, the FBI photographed them visiting the area of Wurtsboro, New York
Wurtsboro, New York
Wurtsboro is a village located on U.S. Route 209 in the town of Mamakating in Sullivan County, New York, United States, near its junction with New York State Route 17...
, where they dug up a bundle of cash in a field that Metsos had placed there two years earlier. Kutsik visited New York again in 2009, where he evidently received $150,000 in cash and a flash drive from Murphy. Kutsik communicated with the SVR using a laptop that Guriyev brought from Moscow after the computer program supplied to him did not function.
Kutsik and Pereverzeva were arrested on June 27, 2010, at their Arlington, Virginia, home. Both had family living in Russia and prosecutors argued that bail be denied under the circumstances.
On January 13, 2011, Russia's oil pipeline monopoly, Transneft
Transneft
Transneft is a Russian state-owned business responsible for the national oil pipelines. It was founded in 1993 and owns the largest oil pipeline system in the world, with a total network length of almost...
, confirmed that Natalya Pereverzeva had been appointed an adviser for foreign economic relations to the company's president, Nikolai Tokarev.
Mikhail Semenko
Mikhail Semenko (Михаил Семенко) was one of the two agents who "operated under their true names." He is reported to have studied for a one year at the Harbin Institute of TechnologyHarbin Institute of Technology
The Harbin Institute of Technology , or HIT, is colloquially known as Hagongda . It is a research university in the city of Harbin, Heilongjiang Province, China....
. He had also attended school and received graduate degrees in the United States at Seton Hall University
Seton Hall University
Seton Hall University is a private Roman Catholic university in South Orange, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1856 by Archbishop James Roosevelt Bayley, Seton Hall is the oldest diocesan university in the United States. Seton Hall is also the oldest and largest Catholic university in the...
, one of the degrees being from the Whitehead School of Diplomacy. He is fluent in English, Russian, Mandarin and Spanish. He had later worked for the Conference Board
The Conference Board
The Conference Board, Inc. is a non-profit, non-partisan business membership and research group. It has approximately 12,000 executives in its network, from 1200 corporations in 60 countries. It holds conferences, convenes executives, conducts economic and business management research, and is seen...
in New York City in 2009, and for 2009–2010 reportedly worked at Travel All Russia, an Arlington, Virginia, travel agency, helping Chinese and Hispanic
Hispanic
Hispanic is a term that originally denoted a relationship to Hispania, which is to say the Iberian Peninsula: Andorra, Gibraltar, Portugal and Spain. During the Modern Era, Hispanic sometimes takes on a more limited meaning, particularly in the United States, where the term means a person of ...
travelers plan trips. He appeared to be in his late 20s; his neighbors said that he was a stylish man who drove a Mercedes S500 sports car and spoke Russian to his girlfriend.
Semenko was first noted by the FBI on June 5 when he used a computer in a restaurant to send encrypted messages presumably to a car parked in the restaurant lot that had Russian diplomatic plates and was parked for about 20 minutes, driven by a Russian official who was known to have transferred money to other Russian sleeper agents in 2004.
On or about June 26, 2010, Semenko met with an undercover FBI agent purporting to be a Russian agent and accepted $5,000, which he delivered to a drop site in Arlington, Virginia park. The drop was made at 11:06 am and Semenko was arrested at his residence in Arlington, Virginia, a suburb of Washington, DC later that day.
"Christopher Metsos" (Pavel Kapustin)
The man known by the name of "Christopher Metsos" was alleged to be the money man and main go-between behind the Illegals Program and the SVR. The real name of Metsos, who assumed the identity of a deceased boy, is unknown. On June 29, 2010, acting on an InterpolInterpol
Interpol, whose full name is the International Criminal Police Organization – INTERPOL, is an organization facilitating international police cooperation...
notice, police arrested the 55-year-old man at the Larnaca International Airport
Larnaca International Airport
Larnaca International Airport is an international airport located southwest of Larnaca, Cyprus. Larnaca International Airport is Cyprus' main international gateway and the larger of the country's two commercial airports, the other being Paphos International Airport on the island's southwestern...
as he was about to board a jet for Budapest
Budapest
Budapest is the capital of Hungary. As the largest city of Hungary, it is the country's principal political, cultural, commercial, industrial, and transportation centre. In 2011, Budapest had 1,733,685 inhabitants, down from its 1989 peak of 2,113,645 due to suburbanization. The Budapest Commuter...
. He was released after posting €27,000 (equivalent to US$33,777) bail and told to report to a police station thereafter, but skipped out and apparently fled the country.
According to the information from US authorities shortly after his flight, "Metsos", who had traveled on a Canadian passport and claimed to be Canadian, had regularly travelled to the US to deliver money to his fellow Russian spies; he would typically drop off money at New York City area locations including a coffee shop, restaurant and subway station. According to his Cyprus lawyer, 'Metsos' had no discernible Russian accent and described himself as a Canadian resident who had divorced 15 years prior and had a son living in Paris.
On July 26, 2010, it was reported by the media that Passport Canada
Passport Canada
Passport Canada is an independent operating agency of the Government of Canada with bureaucratic oversight provided through Foreign Affairs Canada. It operates under the auspices of the Canadian Passport Order which defines the agency...
, upon conducting a review, had revoked the travel document issued to Christopher Metsos.
Late in July 2010, Russian political commentator Yulia Latynina
Yulia Latynina
Yulia Leonidovna Latynina is a Russian journalist, writer and radio host. She works at the radio station Echo of Moscow. She also writes for Novaya Gazeta and The Moscow Times.-Writer, journalist and radio host:...
voiced a theory that "Christopher Metsos" might have been a double agent and was probably now in the US; she did not cite any sources.
In the court verdict read in Moscow on June 27, 2011, it was claimed that the real name of the man who had posed as "Christopher Metsos" was Pavel Kapustin (Павел Капустин), a Russian espionage professional, who was exfiltrated upon being released on bail in Cyprus.
Alexey Karetnikov
On July 13, 2010, the US government disclosed that a 12th, previously undisclosed person, was being held in custody and was said by the media to be implicated in the same federal probe. Later that day, the person was identified as Alexey Karetnikov, a 23 year old former entry-level software tester at MicrosoftMicrosoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
, who had been apprehended on June 28, 2010 in Seattle. He was charged with immigration violations and consented to deportation in lieu of further court proceedings; he was sent to Russia on July 13, 2010. Law enforcement officials said on the day of his deportation that Karetnikov had no direct ties to the other deported persons, although his name came up in the broader investigation.
On July 22, 2010, Newsweek published the comments of Karetnikov's fellow dorm resident, who said that Karetnikov had impressed him as "very oily" and "very Russian"; according to the anonymous source, Karetnikov spoke surprisingly poor English, but was "sophisticated" and knew a lot about Microsoft.
Communication techniques
The Russian agents used private Wi-FiWi-Fi
Wi-Fi or Wifi, is a mechanism for wirelessly connecting electronic devices. A device enabled with Wi-Fi, such as a personal computer, video game console, smartphone, or digital audio player, can connect to the Internet via a wireless network access point. An access point has a range of about 20...
networks, flash memory sticks
USB flash drive
A flash drive is a data storage device that consists of flash memory with an integrated Universal Serial Bus interface. flash drives are typically removable and rewritable, and physically much smaller than a floppy disk. Most weigh less than 30 g...
, and text messages concealed in graphical images to exchange information. Custom steganographic
Steganography
Steganography is the art and science of writing hidden messages in such a way that no one, apart from the sender and intended recipient, suspects the existence of the message, a form of security through obscurity...
software developed in Moscow was used where concealed messages were inserted into otherwise innocuous files. This program was initiated by using the Control-Alt-E keys and entering a 27-character password, which the FBI found written down. Coded bursts of data sent by a shortwave radio transmitter were also used. Using invisible ink and exchanging identical bags in public places were also used.
Chapman used her laptop at a New York coffee shop on 47th Street in January 2010 and electronically transferred data to a Russian official driving by. Two months later, Chapman used a private Wi-Fi network, possibly at a Barnes and Noble store on Greenwich Street in New York, to communicate with the same Russian official, who was nearby. Chapman used a range extender for her laptop.
Court proceedings
Special FBI agent Amit Kachhia-Patel submitted a "sealed complaint" on violation of Title 18, United States CodeUnited States Code
The Code of Laws of the United States of America is a compilation and codification of the general and permanent federal laws of the United States...
, section 371 to Magistrate Judge Hon. Ronald L. Ellis on June 27, 2010. The agent wrote that the violation consisted of "conspiracy to Act as Unregistered Agents of a Foreign Government".
As of July 6, 2010, The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
reported that federal and local prosecutors were seeking a rapid conclusion to the case, avoiding a trial in which sensitive information relating to information-gathering techniques could be disclosed. The proposed deal would have the defendants deported to Russia after pleading guilty to lesser charges.
News of the spy swap was broken by Reuters
Reuters
Reuters is a news agency headquartered in New York City. Until 2008 the Reuters news agency formed part of a British independent company, Reuters Group plc, which was also a provider of financial market data...
Moscow correspondent Guy Faulconbridge who reported on the morning of July 7 that Igor Sutyagin
Igor Sutyagin
Igor V. Sutyagin is a Russian arms control and nuclear weapons specialist. In 1998 he became the head of the subdivision for Military-Technical and Military-Economic Policy at the Institute for US and Canadian Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences in Moscow, where he worked before he was...
, who had been jailed in 2004 for passing secrets to a British company that Russian prosecutors said was a front for the CIA, was to be swapped as part of a deal with the United States to bring home the Russian agents.
In a hearing held in federal court in Manhattan
Manhattan
Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...
on July 8, 2010, presided over by Judge Kimba Wood
Kimba Wood
Kimba Maureen Wood is a United States federal judge for the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York.-Early life and education:...
, all 10 defendants pleaded guilty to a single charge each of secretly conspiring to act as agents of the Russian government. While the charge could carry up to five years in prison, The Washington Post described the pleas as a first step in what could be the largest prisoner swap between the United States and Russia since the days of the Cold War
Cold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
. Under the plea agreements, the defendants also disclosed their true identities and all except for Vicky Peláez admitted that they were Russian citizens.
On July 9, 2010, Attorney General Eric Holder
Eric Holder
Eric Himpton Holder, Jr. is the 82nd and current Attorney General of the United States and the first African American to hold the position, serving under President Barack Obama....
said none of the 10 defendants had passed classified information and therefore none was charged with espionage.
All the defendants were sentenced to time already served and all their assets in the US seized. According to the NYT report after the swap was implemented, the deal had been struck by political leaders of the two nations even before an indictment was brought, with both the US prosecutors and the defendants' lawyers merely "window-dressing".
Prisoner exchange
Reuters reported on July 7–8, 2010, that the U.S. and Russia had reached a deal under which the 10 individuals arrested in that country as part of the Illegals Program would be deported to Russia in exchange for individuals who had been convicted of espionage by Russia. Alexander ZaporozhskyAlexander Zaporozhsky
Alexander Zaporozhsky is a former Colonel in Russia's SVR. He was convicted of treason and given an 18-year prison sentence in 2003 for cooperation with the United States, but has been released in July 2010 as part of a spy swap for the 10 Russian agents arrested in the United States as part of...
, Sergei Skripal
Sergei Skripal
Sergei Skripal is a former Russian officer who was convicted of spying for the United Kingdom.Skripal, who held the rank of colonel, was involved in military intelligence, although the details of his work have been withheld. Some reports have speculated that he was associated with the FSB...
and Gennadiy Vasilenko were also included in the exchange. All of the four persons had served a considerable time in Russian prisons; at least three of the jailed individuals in Russia had been convicted of spying
Espionage
Espionage or spying involves an individual obtaining information that is considered secret or confidential without the permission of the holder of the information. Espionage is inherently clandestine, lest the legitimate holder of the information change plans or take other countermeasures once it...
for either the United Kingdom, or the US.
White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel
Rahm Emanuel
Rahm Israel Emanuel is an American politician and the 55th and current Mayor of Chicago. He was formerly White House Chief of Staff to President Barack Obama...
was reported on July 8, 2010, as saying that President Barack Obama
Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II is the 44th and current President of the United States. He is the first African American to hold the office. Obama previously served as a United States Senator from Illinois, from January 2005 until he resigned following his victory in the 2008 presidential election.Born in...
had approved the swap deal. An administration official was quoted as saying that Obama had not spoken to Russian President Dmitry Medvedev about the spy swap but had been "fully briefed and engaged in the matter." Broad agreement in the US was reported to exist that the agents were being deported swiftly as neither government wanted the case to damage attempts to reset their relationship.
Shortly before the swap deal was reached, nuclear specialist Igor Sutyagin
Igor Sutyagin
Igor V. Sutyagin is a Russian arms control and nuclear weapons specialist. In 1998 he became the head of the subdivision for Military-Technical and Military-Economic Policy at the Institute for US and Canadian Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences in Moscow, where he worked before he was...
, one of the Russian prisoners included in the deal, had been moved to a Moscow prison from a facility near the Arctic Circle, and was then flown to Vienna
Vienna
Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
as part of the exchange between the two nations.
Under a U.S-Russian agreement, the Russian government has agreed to release the Russian prisoners and their family members for resettlement. The Russian prisoners have all served a number of years in prison and some are in poor health.
On July 9, 2010, the Russian ministry of Foreign Affairs has confirmed the exchange of four convicted people for ten Russian citizens citing "humanitarian considerations and constructive partnership development".
On July 9, 2010, all ten suspects were deported on a government-chartered jet from Vision Airlines
Vision Airlines
Vision Airlines, formerly Vision Air, is an airline with its operations headquartered in Suwanee, Georgia. Commercial and charter flights are offered primarily in the southeastern and central portions of the USA. Las Vegas is the farthest western city served by the airline as of April 2011...
took off from New York's LaGuardia Airport
LaGuardia Airport
LaGuardia Airport is an airport located in the northern part of Queens County on Long Island in the City of New York. The airport is located on the waterfront of Flushing Bay and Bowery Bay, and borders the neighborhoods of Astoria, Jackson Heights and East Elmhurst. The airport was originally...
on July 8, carrying the ten Russian agents to Vienna International Airport
Vienna International Airport
Vienna International Airport , located in Schwechat and southeast of central Vienna, is the busiest and biggest airport in Austria. It is often referred to as Schwechat, the name of the county it is in. The airport is capable of handling wide-body aircraft such as the Boeing 747 and Airbus A340...
via Bangor, Maine
Bangor, Maine
Bangor is a city in and the county seat of Penobscot County, Maine, United States, and the major commercial and cultural center for eastern and northern Maine...
, for a refuelling and then for the swap around mid-day of July 9, 2010 (local time). Returning from Vienna were four Russian prisoners – Igor Sutyagin
Igor Sutyagin
Igor V. Sutyagin is a Russian arms control and nuclear weapons specialist. In 1998 he became the head of the subdivision for Military-Technical and Military-Economic Policy at the Institute for US and Canadian Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences in Moscow, where he worked before he was...
, Alexander Zaporozhsky
Alexander Zaporozhsky
Alexander Zaporozhsky is a former Colonel in Russia's SVR. He was convicted of treason and given an 18-year prison sentence in 2003 for cooperation with the United States, but has been released in July 2010 as part of a spy swap for the 10 Russian agents arrested in the United States as part of...
, Sergei Skripal
Sergei Skripal
Sergei Skripal is a former Russian officer who was convicted of spying for the United Kingdom.Skripal, who held the rank of colonel, was involved in military intelligence, although the details of his work have been withheld. Some reports have speculated that he was associated with the FSB...
, Gennady Vasilenko. The aircraft landed at RAF Brize Norton
RAF Brize Norton
RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire, about west north-west of London, is the largest station of the Royal Air Force. It is close to the settlements of Brize Norton, Carterton and Witney....
in Oxfordshire, England, to drop two of the exchanged Russian nationals, then proceeded to Washington Dulles International Airport
Washington Dulles International Airport
Washington Dulles International Airport is a public airport in Dulles, Virginia, 26 miles west of downtown Washington, D.C. The airport serves the Baltimore-Washington-Northern Virginia metropolitan area centered on the District of Columbia. It is named after John Foster Dulles, Secretary of...
on the afternoon of July 9, 2010. The Russian government Yakovlev Yak-42
Yakovlev Yak-42
The Yakovlev Yak-42 is a 100/120-seat three-engined mid-range passenger jet. It was designed as a replacement for several obsolete Aeroflot jets as a mid-range passenger jet...
jet returned to Moscow's Domodedovo airport where, after landing, the 10 spies were kept away from local and international press.
Igor Sutyagin
Igor Sutyagin
Igor V. Sutyagin is a Russian arms control and nuclear weapons specialist. In 1998 he became the head of the subdivision for Military-Technical and Military-Economic Policy at the Institute for US and Canadian Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences in Moscow, where he worked before he was...
(Игорь Сутягин) was an arms control researcher with the Institute for US and Canadian Studies
Institute for US and Canadian Studies
Institute for US and Canadian Studies - is a Russian think tank which is part of the Russian Academy of Sciences, specializing on the comprehensive studies of the United States and Canada....
(ISKAN) of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Russian Academy of Sciences
The Russian Academy of Sciences consists of the national academy of Russia and a network of scientific research institutes from across the Russian Federation as well as auxiliary scientific and social units like libraries, publishers and hospitals....
who had been arrested in 1999 and sentenced in April 2004 to 15 years hard labor on high treason charges. He had collected open-source data
Open source intelligence
Open-source intelligence is a form of intelligence collection management that involves finding, selecting, and acquiring information from publicly available sources and analyzing it to produce actionable intelligence...
on Russian nuclear submarines and missile warning systems, analysed and sold it to a British company that his prosecutors alleged was actually a cover for the US Central Intelligence Agency
Central Intelligence Agency
The Central Intelligence Agency is a civilian intelligence agency of the United States government. It is an executive agency and reports directly to the Director of National Intelligence, responsible for providing national security intelligence assessment to senior United States policymakers...
. He steadfastly denied using any classified information and ISKAN is said to have no access to Russian classified materials. Although Igor Sutyagin had maintained his innocence throughout his conviction, he had to plead guilty shortly before the swap in order to qualify for a Presidential pardon. The U.S. Department of State and Amnesty International classified Sutyagin as a political prisoner, not a spy. The Washington Post commented that Sutyagin's case was different from the other released prisoners and that his original arrest might have been to warn Russians not to cooperate with Western companies and think tanks.
According to his relatives, Igor Sutyagin phoned home upon his arrival in the UK, saying that he had been placed at an undisclosed location in a London suburb, and that British authorities were in a process of granting him a UK visa. Later his lawyer confirmed that Sutyagin was granted a leave to remain in the UK.
Sergei Skripal
Sergei SkripalSergei Skripal
Sergei Skripal is a former Russian officer who was convicted of spying for the United Kingdom.Skripal, who held the rank of colonel, was involved in military intelligence, although the details of his work have been withheld. Some reports have speculated that he was associated with the FSB...
(Сергей Скрипаль) was a colonel in Russia's Military Intelligence Service, who had been sentenced in 2006 to 13 years for spying for Britain. He had spied for Britain's MI5
MI5
The Security Service, commonly known as MI5 , is the United Kingdom's internal counter-intelligence and security agency and is part of its core intelligence machinery alongside the Secret Intelligence Service focused on foreign threats, Government Communications Headquarters and the Defence...
intelligence agency in the late 1990s while serving in the Russian Ground Forces
Russian Ground Forces
The Russian Ground Forces are the land forces of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, formed from parts of the collapsing Soviet Army in 1992. The formation of these forces posed economic challenges after the collapse of the Soviet Union, and required reforms to professionalize the force...
, and had been paid to give away the identities of a number of Russian agents.
Aleksandr Zaporozhsky
Alexander ZaporozhskyAlexander Zaporozhsky
Alexander Zaporozhsky is a former Colonel in Russia's SVR. He was convicted of treason and given an 18-year prison sentence in 2003 for cooperation with the United States, but has been released in July 2010 as part of a spy swap for the 10 Russian agents arrested in the United States as part of...
(Александр Запорожский) was an operative in Russia's Foreign Intelligence Service
Foreign Intelligence Service (Russia)
The Russian Foreign Intelligence Service is Russia's primary external intelligence agency. The SVR is the successor of the First Chief Directorate of the KGB since December 1991...
who had been sentenced in 2003 to 18 years for secret cooperation with the United States. He was released as part of the swap after having served seven years.
Gennady Vasilenko
Gennady Semyonovich Vasilenko is the only person swapped from the Russian side who had not been convicted on espionage (high treason) charges. He had been a KGB officer working for external intelligence and counter-intelligence departments during the 70s and 80s; in 1988, presumably having been fingered by a Russian mole in the FBI, Robert HanssenRobert Hanssen
Robert Philip Hanssen is a former American FBI agent who spied for Soviet and Russian intelligence services against the United States for 22 years from 1979 to 2001...
, he fell under suspicion of being a double agent. Vasilenko was not convicted but instead sacked from the KGB force.
He was arrested in 2005 and charged with an attempted murder. Due to lack of evidence this charge was dropped; instead, he was sentenced to 3 years on possession of illegal firearms and explosive materials. In 2009, Vasilenko was convicted and sentenced again for allegedly having attempted to bribe facility officials.
According to media reports (which cite anonymous sources in Russian intelligence), Vasilenko was included in the list for the swap thanks to a personal request from the former CIA officer Jack Platt who had known him in the line of his CIA official duties (Vasilenko was posted in the U.S. under diplomatic cover from 1976 to 1981).
Alexander Sypachev
Alexander Sypachev was a colonel in the Russian intelligence service who was arrested after delivering a report to a secret location in 2002. He was sentenced to eight years for spying for the CIA. He was reported to have been considered for a swap but was not among the 4 Russians released.Six other individuals were considered for exchange as an even 11:11 swap, but were not exchanged in Vienna.
Political ramifications
While there had been speculations that the arrests of the alleged spies, which occurred barely 72 hours after President MedvedevDmitry Medvedev
Dmitry Anatolyevich Medvedev is the third President of the Russian Federation.Born to a family of academics, Medvedev graduated from the Law Department of Leningrad State University in 1987. He defended his dissertation in 1990 and worked as a docent at his alma mater, now renamed to Saint...
's White House visit, might cast a shadow over President Barack Obama
Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II is the 44th and current President of the United States. He is the first African American to hold the office. Obama previously served as a United States Senator from Illinois, from January 2005 until he resigned following his victory in the 2008 presidential election.Born in...
's effort to improve relations between the US and Russia, on June 30, 2010, the US administration said that it would not expel Russian diplomats and it expressed no indignation that Russia had apparently been caught spying on it.
On June 29, 2010, The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
's comment said: "Revelations about spy rings are the last thing a politician like Medvedev, who presents himself as a moderniser, needs"; in its July 1, 2010, issue, The Economist
The Economist
The Economist is an English-language weekly news and international affairs publication owned by The Economist Newspaper Ltd. and edited in offices in the City of Westminster, London, England. Continuous publication began under founder James Wilson in September 1843...
wrote: "The revelations have caused embarrassment in Moscow, not so much because Russia was caught spying on America, but because it did it so clumsily. Old KGB spies this week lamented the decline in professional standards. But the scandal has rather more serious domestic implications too. It punctures the mystique that helped allow the security services to gain such clout under Vladimir Putin
Vladimir Putin
Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin served as the second President of the Russian Federation and is the current Prime Minister of Russia, as well as chairman of United Russia and Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Union of Russia and Belarus. He became acting President on 31 December 1999, when...
, Russia's former president and present prime minister and a former KGB spy. The story discredits him and his circle of silovik
Silovik
Silovik is a Russian word for politicians from the security or military services, often the officers of the former KGB, the FSB, the Federal Narcotics Control Service and military or other security services who came into power...
i, the former and present members of the security services. Being laughed at is worse than being feared."
On February 1, 2011, the Republic of Ireland
Republic of Ireland
Ireland , described as the Republic of Ireland , is a sovereign state in Europe occupying approximately five-sixths of the island of the same name. Its capital is Dublin. Ireland, which had a population of 4.58 million in 2011, is a constitutional republic governed as a parliamentary democracy,...
's cabinet made a decision to expel a Russian diplomat from the country – the first time since 1983, after the Irish government, based on the Garda Síochána
Garda Síochána
, more commonly referred to as the Gardaí , is the police force of Ireland. The service is headed by the Commissioner who is appointed by the Irish Government. Its headquarters are located in the Phoenix Park in Dublin.- Terminology :...
's report, concluded that the Russian security agent based at the Russian embassy in Rathgar
Rathgar
Rathgar is a suburb of Dublin, Ireland, lying about 3 kilometres south of the city centre.-Amenities:Rathgar is largely a quiet suburb with good amenities, including primary and secondary schools, nursing homes, child-care and sports facilities, and good public transport to the city centre...
had gathered details from six genuine Irish passports that were then effectively cloned in Russia for the US-based spies. Ireland's Department of Foreign Affairs
Department of Foreign Affairs (Ireland)
The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade is a department of the Government of Ireland that is responsible for promoting the interests of Ireland in the European Union and the wider world...
said, "The Government, by today’s action, has once again made clear that it will not tolerate the fabrication and use of forged Irish passports by agents of a foreign State." On February 4, 2011, the Irish press identified the expelled diplomat as Alexander Smirnov, first secretary in the Russian embassy’s consular section. On February 2, 2011, Russia threatened retaliation.
Aftermath of the swap
After the Russian agents were returned to Russia, they were delivered to the SVR headquarters. They were not technically arrested, and relatives could visit them. However they were not allowed to leave the facility until the debriefing process was over, which took several weeks, as the Russian authorities appeared to suspect that betrayal, be it by any of the agents themselves or not, could be a plausible explanation of their exposure.According to her lawyer, Vicky Peláez was placed in a Moscow apartment provided by Russian authorities. She turned down a 2000 USD per month offer from the Russian government and was planning to return to Peru.
On June 28, 2010, Anna Chapman's UK citizenship was revoked.
On July 13, 2010, Russian intelligence sources were quoted as saying that the deported Russian agents would undergo a rigorous series of tests, including a lie detector, to establish whether any of them had acted as a double agent.
The spy affair attracted media attention, including Chapman being described as "glamorous" and U.S. Vice President
Vice President of the United States
The Vice President of the United States is the holder of a public office created by the United States Constitution. The Vice President, together with the President of the United States, is indirectly elected by the people, through the Electoral College, to a four-year term...
Joe Biden
Joe Biden
Joseph Robinette "Joe" Biden, Jr. is the 47th and current Vice President of the United States, serving under President Barack Obama...
joking shortly after the swap on a television chat show to comedian Jay Leno
Jay Leno
James Douglas Muir "Jay" Leno is an American stand-up comedian and television host.From 1992 to 2009, Leno was the host of NBC's The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. Beginning in September 2009, Leno started a primetime talk show, titled The Jay Leno Show, which aired weeknights at 10:00 p.m. ,...
when asked "Do we have any spies that hot?" by saying "Let me be clear. It wasn't my idea to send her back." Joe Biden also said of the Russian agents: "And the ten, they've been here a long time, but they hadn't done much."
On July 24, 2010, in the Crimea
Crimea
Crimea , or the Autonomous Republic of Crimea , is a sub-national unit, an autonomous republic, of Ukraine. It is located on the northern coast of the Black Sea, occupying a peninsula of the same name...
, Russian prime minister Vladimir Putin
Vladimir Putin
Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin served as the second President of the Russian Federation and is the current Prime Minister of Russia, as well as chairman of United Russia and Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Union of Russia and Belarus. He became acting President on 31 December 1999, when...
told reporters, without specifying the date, that he had met with the agents, specifically acknowledging that Chapman was among them; he said that they had had "a tough life" and been turned in as a result of "betrayal"; he also sang with the agents to live music some songs, including "From Where the Motherland Begins" (What the Motherland Begins With or What Does the Motherland Start With). Putin declined to evaluate their work saying that it was not up to him to evaluate but up to specialists and the "ultimate consumers of the information of such type, the Supreme Commander – the president of the Russian Federation."
In mid-August 2010, Sir Stephen Lander
Stephen Lander
Sir Stephen James Lander, KCB is a former chairman of the United Kingdom's Serious Organised Crime Agency , who also served as Director-General of the British Security Service from 1996 to 2002.-Career:...
, Director-General of MI5
MI5
The Security Service, commonly known as MI5 , is the United Kingdom's internal counter-intelligence and security agency and is part of its core intelligence machinery alongside the Secret Intelligence Service focused on foreign threats, Government Communications Headquarters and the Defence...
(1996–2002) voiced an opinion that the very existence of a ring of Russian "illegals" was no laughing matter: "The fact that they're nondescript or don't look serious is part of the charm of the business. That's why the Russians are so successful at some of this stuff. They're able to put people in those positions over time to build up their cover to be useful. They are part of a machine... And the machine is a very professional and serious one."
In October 2010, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev
Dmitry Medvedev
Dmitry Anatolyevich Medvedev is the third President of the Russian Federation.Born to a family of academics, Medvedev graduated from the Law Department of Leningrad State University in 1987. He defended his dissertation in 1990 and worked as a docent at his alma mater, now renamed to Saint...
recognized those "Intelligence agents who worked in the United States and returned to Russia in July" together with other members of the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service for their services to the motherland in ceremonies held at the Kremlin.
In November 2010, an unidentified Kremlin official told Kommersant that an assassination
Assassination
To carry out an assassination is "to murder by a sudden and/or secret attack, often for political reasons." Alternatively, assassination may be defined as "the act of deliberately killing someone, especially a public figure, usually for hire or for political reasons."An assassination may be...
plan for the alleged defector "Colonel Shcherbakov" was already in the works: "We know who he is and where he is"; the source added that "a Mercader" had been sent after Shcherbakov – a reference to assassin Ramón Mercader
Ramón Mercader
Jaime Ramón Mercader del Río Hernández was a Spanish communist who became famous as the murderer of Russian Communist ideologist Leon Trotsky in 1940, in Mexico...
who murdered Leon Trotsky
Leon Trotsky
Leon Trotsky , born Lev Davidovich Bronshtein, was a Russian Marxist revolutionary and theorist, Soviet politician, and the founder and first leader of the Red Army....
in Mexico with an ice axe in 1940. The newspaper article's author later said that the statement could have been made in jest ("spy humour"). On November 13, 2010, U.S. intelligence analyst David Wise suggested that, assuming Shcherbakov was in the US, he must be under FBI protection.
On November 17, 2010, the Interfax news agency cited an unidentified "Russian intelligence source" as saying that "Colonel Alexander Poteyev, a former deputy head of the U.S. division of Directorate S (illegal intelligence) within the SVR" was the subject of both internal and criminal investigations, with the criminal case likely to have been opened as per Article 275 of the RF Criminal Code (high treason). Poteyev's identity (full name: Александр Николаевич Потеев) was confirmed by other ex-KGB and ex-SVR sources. The revelations in the Russian media about the 'treachery' within the SVR were seen by commentators as a sign of an ongoing struggle within the RF top bureaucracy for control over the administratively autonomous agency that had been part of the USSR KGB
First Chief Directorate
The First Chief Directorate , of the Committee for State Security , was the organization responsible for foreign operations and intelligence collection activities by the training and management of the covert agents, intelligence collection management, and the collection of political, scientific and...
.
On December 1, 2010, commentator and researcher Bill Gertz
Bill Gertz
Bill Gertz is an American editor, columnist and reporter for The Washington Times. He is the author of six books and writes a weekly column on the Pentagon and national security issues called "Inside the Ring". During the administration of Bill Clinton Gertz was known for his stories exposing...
quoted a "former intelligence official close to the National Security Agency
National Security Agency
The National Security Agency/Central Security Service is a cryptologic intelligence agency of the United States Department of Defense responsible for the collection and analysis of foreign communications and foreign signals intelligence, as well as protecting U.S...
" (NSA) as saying that the FBI and the NSA were conducting a counterintelligence probe at the NSA Fort Meade, Md., headquarters in a top-secret hunt for a Russian agent, believing that the spy ring was likely acting as conduits for information coming from "one or more Russian spies that NSA is convinced reside at Fort Meade and possibly other DoD
United States Department of Defense
The United States Department of Defense is the U.S...
intel offices". Bill Gertz's report prompted the Russian intelligence expert Andrei Soldatov
Andrei Soldatov
Andrei Soldatov is a Russian investigative journalist and Russian security services expert. He is a co-founders of the Agentura.Ru web site.-Journalism:...
to question the quasi-official version about Poteyev's responsibility. In a Larry King Live
Larry King Live
Larry King Live is an American talk show hosted by Larry King on CNN from 1985 to 2010. It was CNN's most watched and longest-running program, with over one million viewers nightly....
interview, aired by CNN
CNN
Cable News Network is a U.S. cable news channel founded in 1980 by Ted Turner. Upon its launch, CNN was the first channel to provide 24-hour television news coverage, and the first all-news television channel in the United States...
about the same time, RF prime minister Putin maintained that the agents "deserved unconditional respect", "their activities had not done harm to U.S. interests" and that they would only become operational "in crisis periods, say, in case of a breakup of the diplomatic relations."
On December 16, 2010, prime minister Putin, when answering the question during a televised call-in show about whether he had ever signed assassination orders, said that hit squads had long been abolished in Russia; speaking specifically of the turncoat allegedly responsible for exposing the 10 sleeper agents, he denounced him as a "brute" and a "pig" saying that "the traitors will croak all by themselves".
On May 3, 2011, in Moscow, Alexander Poteyev was indicted on high treason and desertion charges and later put on trial in absentia
In absentia
In absentia is Latin for "in the absence". In legal use, it usually means a trial at which the defendant is not physically present. The phrase is not ordinarily a mere observation, but suggests recognition of violation to a defendant's right to be present in court proceedings in a criminal trial.In...
. On 27 June 2011, he was found guilty in absentia on both charges and convicted to 25 years of imprisonment; the judge's verdict said that Poteyev had been recruited to the CIA in 1999. His court-appointed advocate said that Poteyev's remuneration
Remuneration
Remuneration is the total compensation that an employee receives in exchange for the service they perform for their employer. Typically, this consists of monetary rewards, also referred to as wage or salary...
from the US government might have reached $55 million.
See also
- Rudolf Abel, Gary PowersGary PowersFrancis Gary Powers was an American pilot whose Central Intelligence Agency U-2 spy plane was shot down while flying a reconnaissance mission over Soviet Union airspace, causing the 1960 U-2 incident.- Early life :...
and Frederic PryorFrederic PryorFrederic L. Pryor is a Senior Research Scholar of Economics at Swarthmore College. He is best known for his subsidiary role in a Cold War spy swap.-Cold War incident:In August, 1961, Pryor was arrested and held without charge by the East German police...
(swapped 1962) - Anna FermanovaAnna FermanovaAnna Fermanova also known as Anya Fermanov is a Latvian-American television personality and alleged smuggler. While living in Texas, Fermanova allegedly smuggled optic with night vision to her husband in Russia.-Biography:...
, arrested on July 15, 2010 - Russia – United States relations
- Russian influence operations in the United StatesRussian influence operations in the United StatesRussian influence operations in the United States have existed since 1992.According to American counterintelligence, in 2007 Russian espionage reached Cold War levels.-Doctrine:...
External links
- Official Press Release from the United States Department of JusticeUnited States Department of JusticeThe United States Department of Justice , is the United States federal executive department responsible for the enforcement of the law and administration of justice, equivalent to the justice or interior ministries of other countries.The Department is led by the Attorney General, who is nominated...
Office of Public Affairs (includes copies of both indictments) - "Criminal Complaints From the Justice Department" at The New York Times
- Photos of the spies from Ukrainian news
News media
- Profile: Russia's 'spies' in the suburbs, BBC News, July 2, 2010, includes related stories and video
- Collected news and commentary at The GuardianThe GuardianThe Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
- Collected news and commentary at The New York Times
- Alleged Russian spies: Guide to the 11 Suspects, The Huffington PostThe Huffington PostThe Huffington Post is an American news website and content-aggregating blog founded by Arianna Huffington, Kenneth Lerer, and Jonah Peretti, featuring liberal minded columnists and various news sources. The site offers coverage of politics, theology, media, business, entertainment, living, style,...
, June 30, 2010 - Anna Chapman, One Last Look at The Smoking GunThe Smoking GunThe Smoking Gun is a website that posts legal documents, arrest records, and police mugshots on a daily basis. The intent is to bring to the public light information that is damning, shocking, outrageous, or amazing, yet also somewhat obscure or unreported by more mainstream media sources...
, July 28, 2010, includes mugshots of the other spies