Economic Espionage / Theft of Space Shuttle and Rocket Secrets for China

On Feb. 11, 2010 former Rockwell and Boeing engineer Dongfan “Greg” Chung was sentenced to 188 months imprisonment and three years’ supervised release after his Jul. 16, 2009 conviction in the Central District of California. Chung was convicted of charges of economic espionage and acting as an illegal agent of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), for whom he stole restricted technology and Boeing trade secrets, including information related to the Space Shuttle program and the Delta IV rocket. According to the judge’s ruling, Chung served as an illegal agent of China for more than 30 years and kept more than 300,000 pages of documents reflecting Boeing trade secrets stashed in his home as part of his mission of steal aerospace and military trade secrets from Boeing to assist the Chinese government. Chung sent Boeing trade secrets to the PRC via the mail, via sea freight, via the Chinese consulate in San Francisco, and via a Chinese agent named Chi Mak. On several occasions, Chung also used the trade secrets that he misappropriated from Boeing to prepare detailed briefings that he later presented to Chinese officials in the PRC. Chung was originally arrested on Feb. 11, 2008, in Southern California after being indicted on eight counts of economic espionage, one count of conspiracy to commit economic espionage, one count of acting as an unregistered foreign agent, one count of obstruction of justice, and three counts of making false statements to the FBI. The investigation was conducted by the FBI and NASA.