A Navy sailor pleaded guilty to conspiracy and receiving a bribe from a public official in connection with providing China information about Department of the Navy plans and logistics.
As part of the plea agreement between Wenheng “Thomas” Zhao, 26, and the United States Department of Justice, Zhao will have to forfeit $14,866.76, the amount he received as part of the 14 bribes he took, already seized during his arrest, according to the plea agreement and a news release from the Central District of California’s Attorney General’s Office.
He will be sentenced in a separate hearing and faces up to 20 years in prison for the two charges, according to the release.
“Officer Zhao betrayed his country and the men and women of the U.S. Navy by accepting bribes from a foreign adversary,” U.S. Attorney Martin Estrada said in the release. “While he and the [People’s Republic of China] officer he served took great pains to conceal their corrupt scheme, investigators were vigilant in uncovering this shameful plot. Today’s resolution, requiring Zhao to plead guilty to all charges against him, shows that we will act swiftly and decisively to protect our nation from those who seek to undermine our security.”
Zhao, who served as a construction electrician 2nd Class, was arrested in August. Another sailor, Jinchao Wei, was also arrested and charged with giving information to a Chinese operative, USNI News previously reported.
According to the plea agreement, starting in 2021, Zhao worked with a Chinese intelligence officer to exchange military information in exchange for money. Documents that Zhao gave to the Chinese officer included those marked controlled unclassified information (CUI). The documents focused on the U.S. Navy and included training and infrastructure information.
This included a photograph of controlled operational plans for the Large Scale Exercise 2021 in the Indo-Pacific region that was marked CUI, photographs of computers screens with military training exercise information, and photos of diagrams and blueprints of the electrical system in Ground/Air Task Oriented Radar storage, according to the plea agreement.
According to the latest online court documents, Wei, who has been charged with conspiracy to provide national defense information to a Chinese intelligence officer, is so far continuing forward with a trial. He entered a no guilty plea during his arraignment.
