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June 28, 2010

NOTE The following text is a quote:

http://newyork.fbi.gov/dojpressrel/pressrel10/nyfo062810a.htm

Ten Alleged Secret Agents Arrested in the United States

Multi-year FBI Investigation Uncovers Network in the United States Tasked with Recruiting Sources and Collecting Information for Russia

WASHINGTON—Eight individuals were arrested Sunday for allegedly carrying out long-term, “deep-cover” assignments in the United States on behalf of the Russian Federation, the Justice Department announced today. Two additional defendants were also arrested Sunday for allegedly participating in the same Russian intelligence program within the United States.

In total, 11 defendants, including the 10 arrested, are charged in two separate criminal complaints with conspiring to act as unlawful agents of the Russian Federation within the United States. Federal law prohibits individuals from acting as agents of foreign governments within the United States without prior notification to the U.S. Attorney General. Nine of the defendants are also charged with conspiracy to commit money laundering.

The defendants known as “Richard Murphy” and “Cynthia Murphy” were arrested yesterday by FBI agents at their residence in Montclair, N.J., and are expected to appear in federal court in Manhattan today. Vicky Pelaez and the defendant known as “Juan Lazaro” were arrested yesterday at their residence in Yonkers, N.Y., and are expected to appear in federal court in Manhattan today. Anna Chapman was arrested in Manhattan yesterday and is expected to appear in federal court in Manhattan today.

The defendants known as “Michael Zottoli” and “Patricia Mills” were arrested yesterday at their residence in Arlington, Va., and are appearing in federal court in Alexandria, Va., today. Defendant Mikhail Semenko was arrested yesterday at his residence in Arlington and is appearing in federal court in Alexandria today. In addition, the defendants known as “Donald Howard Heathfield” and “Tracey Lee Ann Foley” were arrested at their residence in Boston yesterday and are appearing in federal court in Boston today. The defendant known as “Christopher R. Metsos” remains at large.

The charges are filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. The charge of conspiracy to act as an agent of a foreign government without notifying the U.S. Attorney General carries a maximum penalty of five years in prison. All the defendants are charged with this violation. The charge of conspiracy to commit money laundering carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison. All the defendants except Chapman and Semenko are charged with this violation.

This case is the result of a multi-year investigation conducted by the FBI; the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York; and the Counterespionage Section and the Office of Intelligence within the Justice Department’s National Security Division.

The prosecution is being handled by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Michael Farbiarz, Glen Kopp and Jason Smith of the Terrorism and International Narcotics Unit of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York, and Trial Attorneys Kathleen Kedian and Richard Scott of the Counterespionage Section of the Justice Department’s National Security Division.

The charges and allegations contained in the criminal complaints are merely allegations, and the defendants are presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.

http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/years/2010/0628101spy5.html
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http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/years/2010/0628101spy1.html

“FBI Busts Russian Spies
Feds: Covert agents caught using old school, high-tech spycraft”

SNIPPET: “JUNE 28—A decade-long FBI probe into a ring of covert Russian agents living and working in the U.S. resulted yesterday in the arrest of ten spies on conspiracy and money laundering charges. Criminal complaints filed today in U.S. District Court in New York do not detail the information relayed by the covert agents to handlers with the Russian Federation’s Moscow-based intelligence service. But the court filings provide a remarkable blow-by-blow of the FBI’s extensive probe of the Russian agents, known as “illegals,” whose goal, investigators allege, was to “become sufficiently ‘Americanized’ such that they can gather information about the United States for Russia” and recruit sources from “United States policy-making circles.” As seen on the following pages, the Russian agents employed spycraft both prosaic and high tech.”

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2543478/posts

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ynews/20100628/ts_ynews/ynews_ts2909

SNIPPET: “According to the LinkedIn profile, Heathfield attended Harvard’s Kennedy School in 1999 and 2000, after going to school in Paris. That matches the Department of Justice complaint that says Heathfield arrived in the U.S. in 1999.

Future Map, according to its website, “help[s] governments, enterprises and international organizations better prepare for the future and make better strategic decisions.” Future Map’s website claims that the technology for the software was “born as an initiative involving a group of graduates from Harvard University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and private-sector specialists in the USA, the UK and France working to support forward-looking decision processes.”

The LinkedIn profile also lists Heathfield as a past partner at Global Partners Inc., a management consulting firm that lists Abbott Labs, Boston Scientific, and GE as clients. Global Partners’ website also lists a Donald Heathfield.”

Note: The following post is a quote:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2543552/posts

Russian spy assumed Burlington man’s identity
Hamilton Spectator ^ | June 29, 2010
Posted on June 29, 2010 4:01:24 AM PDT by Tailgunner Joe

U.S. officials charged 11 people with being deep-cover Russian spies after a multi-year investigation that turned up allegations of a vast undercover network designed to collect information for Moscow, including new U.S. nuclear weapons research.

Four of the alleged spy ring’s members were posing as Canadians, one of whom had apparently co-opted the identity of the son of a Burlington man who died in 2005.

Court papers filed by the FBI say Donald Howard Heathfield, Tracey Lee Ann Foley, Patricia Mills and Christopher R. Metsos all claimed to be Canadian. Metsos remains at large.

Investigators allege Heathfield assumed the identity of a dead Burlington man as part of his spy legend — possibly using his actual birth certificate.

When investigators searched a Cambridge, Mass., safety deposit box, they found a photocopy of a birth certificate in the name of Donald Howard Graham Heathfield.

While the birth certificate “appears to be real,” an obituary search revealed the man to be the dead son of Howard William Heathfield of Burlington, who died in June 2005 at age 70.

Heathfield and Foley, a married couple who lived near Boston, claimed to be naturalized U.S. citizens born in Canada, court documents say.

Laurie Heathfield, of Toronto, is the sister of the man whose birth certificate is being used.

“Nothing surprises me in life anymore,” she said. “It’s kind of weird, but until somebody from a legal standpoint contacts me, I’m not too worried about it.”

No investigators have contacted her about the matter.

The Donald Heathfield name is also not her brother’s real name though the name of her late father, who lived in Burlington, is correct, she said.

The spies were given the single, primary goal of becoming “sufficiently ‘Americanized’” to gain access to the U.S. government’s planning and policy apparatus, said the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

Foley, though claiming to be Canadian-born, travelled on a fake British passport prepared for her by the SVR, the court papers say.

The FBI says Moscow instructed the couple to gather information on U.S. foreign policy in areas such as use of the Internet by terrorists, the military and Central Asia. In one instance, Heathfield supposedly told his spymasters he had made contact with a U.S. nuclear weapons researcher.

The FBI alleges Heathfield and Foley communicated with Moscow through special computer software that embeds secret messages in images — a process known as steganography.

Mills and Metsos also claimed to be Canadian citizens.

Mills and her co-defendant husband, Michael Zottoli, lived for years in Seattle before moving to Arlington, Va., last October.

The FBI says Metsos, perhaps the most mysterious of the four purporting to be Canadian, does not live in the United States. The agency did not disclose his country of residence, but said he often travelled to the U.S. to meet with agents and pay them on behalf of Moscow.

In 2004, a Russian government official surreptitiously handed Metsos money in New York, the documents allege. Metsos then buried some cash in upstate New York and, two years later, Mills and Zottoli dug it up, the FBI says.

Some of the material collected and transmitted by the accused spies dealt with U.S. research on nuclear “bunker buster” bombs, according to the federal document charging the members of the ring. They also sought information on Pentagon planning, U.S. policy toward Central Asia and research on terrorists gaining access to the Internet.

Ten of the suspects were arrested in Virginia, New York, New Jersey and Boston and charged with federal offences ranging from conspiring to act as unlawful foreign agents to conspiracy to commit money laundering.

The 10 face prison sentences ranging from five to 20 years, if convicted.