A former case officer for the Defense Intelligence Agency faces 15 years in prison after pleading guilty to spying on the United States on behalf of China.
Utah born Ron Rockwell Hansen, 59, who now resides in Syracuse residentis charged with espionage after prosecutors allege he was paid thousands by Chinese agents for information.

The ex-warrant officer, who retired from the U.S. Army in 2006 and took up a post at the Defense Intelligence Agency, learned to speak Russian and Mandarin-Chinese fluently, and was later hired to his brother’s cyber-security firm H-11 Digital Forensics.

Hansen [photo], was arrested by the FBI in June as he was trying to board a flight for China. The agency said he had been approached by Chinese intelligence agents in 2014, and received not less than $800,000 in funds originating from China as compensation for transmitting U.S. national secrets working as a double-agent.
As part of his espionage directives   from the Chinese, Hansen tried to solicit information from a DIA intelligence officer between May 2016 and June 2018.
He taught the agent how to clandestinely record and transmit information at the Chinese agents’ behest, which he then planned to sell for $200,000.
However, that agent reported Hansen to the FBI who began investigating him. Court documents show he had already been on their radar after he previously tried to access classified information.

The ex warrant officer, who retired from the U.S. Army in 2006 and took up a post at the Defense Intelligence Agency, learned to speak Russian and Mandarin-Chinese fluently, and was later hired to his brother’s cyber-security firm H-11 Digital Forensics (DIA HQ is pictured)

FBI agents took Hansen into custody in June, when he was traveling to the Seattle-Tacoma International Airport to take a connecting flight to China.

Chinese agents had demanded the ‘China ops plan’ – the U.S. military’s operational strategy for potential military intervention with China, court documents show.
On June 2, 2018, Hansen met with the officer, who was now a secret source for the FBI, and was handed the classified documents before his scheduled flight to China.
Hansen was initially charged with 15 counts related to espionage, however he only pleaded guilty to the first charge – attempt to gather or deliver defense information.

Prosecutors are expected to ask the court to dismiss the remaining 14, which include bulk cash smuggling and acting as an agent of a foreign government.
Hansen pleaded guilty before U.S. District Court in Salt Lake City. He is a resident of Syracuse, Utah. The plea deal Hansen agreed to stipulated a 15-year sentence, pending court approval, DoJ officials said in their announcement.
He is scheduled to be formally sentenced September 24.