[FPSPACE] ex-Boeing engineer charged in Shuttle spy case involving PRC

[Peter Pesavento]

>From Reuters.

 

http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSWAT00887420080211

 


Ex-Boeing engineer charged in China spy case


Mon Feb 11, 2008 2:48pm EST

By James Vicini

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A former Boeing engineer was arrested on Monday on
charges of stealing trade secrets for China related to several aerospace
programs, including the Space Shuttle, the U.S. Justice Department said.

It also announced a separate case in which a U.S. Defense Department
official and two others were arrested on Monday on espionage charges
involving the passing of classified U.S. government documents to China.

Department officials said Dongfan "Greg" Chung, 72, of Orange, California,
who was employed by Rockwell International from 1973 until its defense and
space unit was acquired by Boeing in 1996, was arrested without incident at
his residence.

He was accused of espionage involving economic secrets, conspiracy and other
charges.

Chung, a China native who is a naturalized U.S. citizen, held a secret
security clearance when he worked at Rockwell and Boeing on the Space
Shuttle program, the officials said.

He retired from the company in 2002, but the next year he returned to Boeing
as a contractor, a position he held until September 2006.

According to the charges against him, Chung took and concealed Boeing trade
secrets relating to the Space Shuttle, the C-17 military transport aircraft
and the Delta IV rocket.

A Boeing spokesman, Dan Beck, said his company has been working with
investigators.

"We do not comment on ongoing government criminal investigations and will
not comment on the subject matter of the case," Beck said. "Boeing is not a
target of the investigation and has been cooperating with the government."

The other case involved Gregg William Bergersen, a Defense Department
official, and Tai Shen Kuo and Yu Xin Kang, both of New Orleans.

Working under the direction of an individual identified in court documents
only as "PRC Official A," Kuo cultivated friendships with Bergersen and
others in the U.S. government and obtained from them sensitive classified
information for China.

The criminal conduct spanned a two-year period from January 2006 to February
2008, the documents said.

Kuo, a naturalized U.S. citizen and New Orleans businessman, gathered the
information on behalf of China. Bergersen is a weapons systems policy
analyst at the Arlington, Va.-based Defense Security Cooperation Agency,
which is part of the Defense Department.

(Reporting by James Vicini, editing by David Alexander)