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SANTA ANA – A Washington Times reporter has been subpoenaed by a federal judge who wants him to reveal the sources for a story he wrote about an engineer convicted of conspiracy to export U.S. defense technology to China. National security reporter Bill Gertz was ordered to appear before U.S. District Judge Cormac Carney in June, the newspaper reported Saturday. The judge has also requested e-mail messages, files and correspondences. Gertz cited U.S. government sources in a 2006 story saying that Justice Department officials approved an indictment against Tai Mak and that four of Mak's relatives would also be charged....

Petraeus: Al Qaida Trying to 'Come Back In' U.S. military officials said there will be no significant reduction in coalition troops in the Baghdad area as part of an effort to stop the Al Qaida offensive in northern Iraq. They said Al Qaida was trying to reenter Baghdad and reverse its losses in 2007. "Al Qaida is trying to come back in," U.S. military commander Gen. David Petraeus said. "We can feel it and see it, and what we're trying to do is rip out any roots before they can get deeply into the ground." Read More Militants Assert...

A Chinese-born engineer convicted of conspiracy to export U.S. defense technology to China was sentenced Monday to 24 1/2 years in federal prison by a judge who said the defendant betrayed his adopted country. Chi Mak, 67, who worked on naval propulsion systems, was also convicted of acting as an unregistered foreign agent, attempting to violate export control laws and making false statements to the FBI. Federal prosecutors asked for 30 years, while Mak's defense team proposed 10 years. There is no parole in the federal prison system. Mak asked U.S. District Judge Cormac J. Carney for leniency before sentencing....

Federal agents today arrested four people on espionage charges, including a Defense Department employee from Alexandria, and accused them of passing classified information to China that included details about the Space Shuttle and U.S. military sales to Taiwan. The DOD employee, Gregg William Bergersen, 51, was charged in U.S. District Court in Alexandria with conspiracy to disclose national defense information

WASHINGTON — Law enforcement officials say a U.S. government official and up to four Chinese nationals are being charged with spying on the United States. The Associated Press has learned they are being accused of spying and giving U.S. military secrets to the Chinese government. Law enforcement officials who spoke on condition of anonymity say the charges are being unsealed later Monday by federal courts in California and Virginia. The officials asked for anonymity because the case has not yet been made public. It was not immediately clear where in the government the unnamed U.S. official worked.

A federal judge denied a motion Monday for a new trial in the case of a Chinese-born engineer convicted of conspiring to export U.S. defense technology to China. U.S. District Judge Cormac Carney rejected Chi Mak's motion after a hearing that included testimony from several defense witnesses. Carney set Mak's sentencing for March 24. Mak could face up to 45 years in prison. Mak, 67, was convicted last May of conspiring to export U.S. defense technology to China, including data on an electronic propulsion system that prosecutors said could make submarines virtually undetectable. A jury also found him guilty of...

The last defendant in an extended family charged with conspiring to export U.S. defense technology to China reached a plea deal that brought the case to an abrupt end, authorities said Wednesday. Rebecca Laiwah Chiu, 63, reached the deal with federal prosecutors late Tuesday on the eve of her trial on charges of conspiracy to export defense articles, failure to register as a foreign agent and making false statements to the FBI. Chiu instead pleaded guilty to one count of acting as a foreign agent without registering with the U.S. government and will serve three years in prison, said her...

Three family members of a Chinese-born engineer convicted of attempting to export U.S. defense technology to China have pleaded guilty to their roles in the conspiracy, authorities said Monday. All three were set to stand trial Tuesday. Instead, engineer Chi Mak's brother Tai Mak pleaded guilty Monday to conspiring to export control laws; Tai Mak's wife, Fuk Li, pleaded guilty Monday to aiding and abetting the violation of export control laws; and the couple's son, Yui "Billy" Mak, pleaded guilty last week to aiding and abetting the violation of export control laws. Chi Mak's wife, Rebecca Laiwah Chiu, is still...

California jury convicts engineer of conspiring to steal U.S. military secrets for China Friday May 11, 2007 By GILLIAN FLACCUS Associated Press Writer SANTA ANA, Calif. (AP) After a six-week trial, a federal jury convicted a Chinese-born engineer of conspiring to export U.S. defense technology to China, including data on an electronic propulsion system that could make submarines virtually undetectable. Friends and colleagues knew Chi Mak as an unassuming, brilliant man who worked 12-hour days as an engineer for a defense contractor, rarely went out and scrimped to pay off his 700-square-foot suburban home. Federal prosecutors portrayed Mak as a...

SANTA ANA, Calif. - Jurors convicted a Chinese-born engineer Thursday of conspiring to export U.S. defense technology to China, including data on an electronic propulsion system that could make submarines virtually undetectable. Chi Mak also was found guilty of being an unregistered foreign agent. Prosecutors had dropped a charge of actually exporting defense articles. When the verdict was read, Mak at first showed no emotion but then appeared to hold back tears as defense attorney Marilyn Bednarsky teared up and rubbed his back. Defense attorney Ron Kaye's face was flush. Mak faces up to 35 years in prison when he...

A Chinese-born engineer who worked on U.S. naval technology sought to give China information on propulsion of future submarines, a federal prosecutor said Monday in urging jurors to convict the defendant of conspiring to export defense materials and other crimes. "The defendant was spying for China," Assistant U.S. Attorney Craig Missakian said in closing arguments. "This man's life has been defined by one thing and that is hiding his connection to the People's Republic of China." The six-week case against Chi Mak, 66, a naturalized U.S. citizen, went to the jury later in the day after prosecutors claimed he took...

Testimony in the case of a Chinese-born engineer accused of stealing U.S. defense secrets revolved Thursday around whether he needed government approval to export a document on a quiet submarine propulsion system to China. Authorities believe Chi Mak, a naturalized U.S. citizen, stole thousands of pages of defense documents from his defense contractor employer, Power Paragon, and gave them to his brother, who passed them along to Chinese authorities over a number of years. He was arrested in 2005 in Los Angeles after FBI agents stopped his brother and sister-in-law as they boarded a flight to Hong Kong. Investigators said...

SANTA ANA, Calif. - A Navy investigator testified Wednesday that a computer disk seized from the brother of a Chinese-born engineer accused of stealing U.S. defense technology secrets contained encrypted files. Nicholas Mikus, an investigative computer specialist for the Naval Criminal Investigative Service, said the files could only be unlocked with a specific "key," a chain of 113 letters that was stored on a floppy disk. Mikus was the latest witness called by the government in its case against Chi Mak, an engineer accused of passing sensitive military information to the Chinese government for more than 20 years. Mak, a...

SANTA ANA - A federal agent testified Friday that investigators found a computer disk with sensitive details on the Navy's next generation of destroyers when they searched the home of a Chinese-American engineer accused of illegally sending technology information to China. FBI Special Agent James Gaylord said the CD was found at the home of Chi Mak after his arrest and it contained materials related to the so-called DDX, highly advanced guided-missile warships that are under development. The documents were sent by the Navy to companies during contract bidding, including the company Mak worked for, Power Paragon Inc. The company...

A defense company engineer accused of conspiring to send technical military information to China was never given permission to share sensitive documents on a future Navy warship with his brother, a security official for the company testified Thursday. Fred Witham, who oversees security for Power Paragon Inc., was questioned about defendant Chi Mak's access to a so-called DDX document. The government claims the document was found on a computer belonging to Mak's brother, who is also charged in the case. Mak, a Chinese-born naturalized U.S. citizen, went on trial this week in U.S. District Court. Prosecutors also asked Witham whether...

LOS ANGELES (AFP) - Prosecutors in the trial of US engineer Chi Mak said Wednesday that secret US submarine technology information he had tried to smuggle to China was aimed at helping it take control of Taiwan. Assistant US attorney Greg Staples said the sensitive data on a computer disk Mak tried to provide China through his brother included information on Quiet Electric Drive, a technology under development to make submarines silent. China's navy "is supportive of the re-taking of Taiwan (and) the chief impediment to retaking Taiwan is the 7th fleet of the US Navy," Staples said as the...

A jury of eight women and four men was selected Tuesday for the federal trial of a Chinese-American engineer accused of stealing military secrets and conspiring to send them to China. The panel and four alternates, who will hear opening statements on Wednesday, were chosen after the judge and attorneys quizzed prospective jurors on a range of issues including views on Chinese immigrants, China's role in the world, the U.S. Navy, protection of military technology and occupations. Among jurors were a woman whose husband works with the Navy and government agencies, a man who loads trucks for a container company,...

LOS ANGELES – The FBI knew about Chi Mak's retirement plans, what his dining room looked like and what he allegedly took home from work. The 66-year-old engineer for a Southern California defense contractor and his 57-year-old brother, Tai Mak, were under surveillance for months. Agents tapped the Maks' phones, planted listening devices in their cars, sifted through their trash and installed a closed-circuit camera above Chi Mak's dining-room table. Investigators suspected Chi Mak was taking restricted documents about naval technology from his job at Anaheim-based defense contractor Power Paragon and passing them to his brother, who was going to...

LOS ANGELES A federal court plans to investigate whether government officials illegally supplied grand jury information in a U.S. military secrets case to a Washington Times reporter. Court papers show the investigation seeks to uncover a possible source and content of "improper communications" with Times reporter William Gertz for a story he wrote in May. The order, entered Wednesday by a federal judge in Orange County, comes at the request of a defense attorney for Rebecca Laiwah Chiu, one of five family members indicted in an alleged scheme to send sensitive information about Navy warships to China. The request was...

LOS ANGELES Two family members were charged Wednesday in the federal case against a Chinese-American engineer accused of trying to send sensitive information about Navy warships to China. An indictment returned by a grand jury in Santa Ana charged Billy Mak, 26, and his mother, Fuk Heung Li, 48, with making false statements and acting as agents of a foreign government, namely China, without prior notification to the U.S. attorney general, said FBI spokeswoman Laura Eimiller. Billy Mak is the nephew of Chi Mak, who allegedly took computer disks from an Anaheim defense contractor where he was lead engineer on...