DOJ indicts nearly a dozen people in China espionage cases

Justice Department officials on Monday announced that they’d charged nearly a dozen people in three separate cases related to espionage activity on behalf of China.

Seven People’s Republic of China individuals have been charged in the Eastern District of New York — two of them were arrested on Oct. 20 — with participating in a scheme to force a U.S. resident to return to China. Two Chinese individuals were charged in the same district with attempting to obstruct the criminal prosecution of a China-based telecommunications company, and four Chinese nationals have been charged in the District of New Jersey with conspiring to act as illegal agents on behalf of China.

“As these cases demonstrate, the government of China sought to interfere with the rights and freedoms of individuals in the United States and to undermine our judicial system that protects those rights. They did not succeed,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said at a news conference on Monday afternoon.

Garland, joined by FBI Director Christopher Wray and other Justice Department officials, said the new actions would “disrupt criminal activity” of individuals working on behalf of China, while reiterating that the defendants were all presumed innocent until proven guilty in court.

The two people charged in the Eastern District of New York — unsealed in a complaint on Monday — allegedly directed a U.S. government employee to steal confidential information about the criminal prosecution of a global telecommunications company based in China. The government employee the defendants recruited for information was actually a double agent, working on behalf of the FBI.

“This was an egregious attempt by PRC intelligence officers to shield a PRC-based company from accountability and to undermine the integrity of our judicial system,” Garland said.

The case in New Jersey alleges that the four people used the cover of a Chinese academic institution to direct U.S. individuals to further China’s intelligence mission, including by having technology from the U.S. shipped to China.

The third case, in the Eastern District of New York, accuses the seven people of engaging in a multi-year scheme to force a U.S. resident — who China alleges is a fugitive — to return to China by using threats and harassment against the victim and their family.

“The Justice Department will not tolerate attempts by any foreign power to undermine the rule of law upon which our democracy is based,” Garland said. “We will continue to fiercely protect the rights guaranteed to everyone in our country. And we will defend the integrity of our institutions.”