![]() That offer set off a months-long undercover investigation in which agents had lengthy email discussions with the person they later identified as Jonathan Toebbe. ![]() 31, 2020 I will conclude you are uninterested and will approach other possible buyers,” the letter said, according to the FBI agent. ![]() In a package postmarked April 1, 2020, a person whom the FBI says is Jonathan Toebbe offered to sell nuclear sub secrets to the foreign government and included in his introductory letter a small sample of Navy documents. The country they reached out to has not been named in public court filings or proceedings. In court filings and hearings, prosecutors have painted a portrait of a seemingly normal suburban couple who carefully planned for years to sell secrets about Virginia-class nuclear submarines to a foreign country. But prosecutors have called those statements “conveniently timed and clearly biased,” and he said in court Monday that he “conspired with Diana Toebbe” in the case. Since his arrest, Jonathan Toebbe has claimed his wife did not know what he was doing. Toebbe was complicit in her husband’s alleged espionage scheme.” Yet the issue in this case will be whether or not Mrs. Toebbe went with her husband to three ‘dead drops’ that were apparently part of his scheme to sell classified information to some third country. In a court filing last month, Diana Toebbe’s lawyers argued there is “no dispute in this case that Mrs. Diana Toebbe tried repeatedly to be released on bond, saying she did not know of her husband’s spy plans and needs to be home with their two school-age children. The couple were denied bail after prosecutors said they might flee the country rather than face trial. The agency set up a sting operation that allegedly caught the Toebbes going to “dead drop” sites within driving distance from their home. According to court papers, investigators learned of the plot after the country forwarded the couple’s sales pitch to the FBI. submarines to an unidentified foreign country. He also agreed to help authorities recover all restricted or sensitive government data, as well as the money that an undercover FBI agent gave him as part of a sting operation to gather evidence against him.Īuthorities say the Toebbes, of Annapolis, Md., schemed together to offer to sell government secrets about nuclear propulsion systems on U.S. ![]() The plea agreement calls for a possible sentence of 12 ½ to 17 ½ years in prison.Under the terms of the agreement, he faces a likely prison sentence of roughly 12 years to 17 1/2 years. Jose Luis Magana / AP fileĪt a hearing Monday in a West Virginia courtroom, Jonathan Toebbe pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to communicate restricted data. District Courthouse in Martinsburg, W.Va., on Oct. A Homeland Security police officer walks with his sniffing dog outside of the U.S. Prosecutors say Toebbe hid memory cards containing the sensitive information inside peanut butter sandwiches, Band-aid wrappers and chewing gum packages. Her husband, Jonathan Toebbe, 43, is a former Navy nuclear engineer who was accused of trying to pass information about designs for nuclear-powered submarines to an undercover FBI agent posing as a representative of a foreign government. A federal judge will decide the exact sentence after a pre-sentence investigation and hearing. Under the terms of her deal, she will serve a sentence of not more than 36 months, the Justice Department said. in anthropology, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to communicate restricted data related to nuclear designs, which carries a maximum statutory penalty of up to life in prison. The Justice Department said Diana Toebbe, who has a Ph.D.
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