Navy Nuclear Engineer Pleads Guilty in Submarine Espionage Case
The New York Times
Jonathan Toebbe, who was arrested in October along with his wife, is set to face 12 years or more in prison under a plea deal with federal prosecutors.
A U.S. Navy nuclear engineer pleaded guilty on Monday to a charge that he tried to sell some of America’s most closely guarded submarine secrets to a foreign country, in an agreement that is likely to send him to prison for 12 years or more.
The engineer, Jonathan Toebbe, was arrested in October with his wife, Diana Toebbe, and both had initially pleaded not guilty to one count of conspiracy to communicate restricted data and two counts of communication of restricted data. F.B.I. agents laid out a detailed account of how the Toebbes wrote to a foreign country offering to sell submarine nuclear reactor secrets in exchange for cryptocurrency.
Under the plea agreement, entered in federal court in Martinsburg, W.Va., Mr. Toebbe pleaded guilty to a single charge of conspiracy to communicate restricted data. Ms. Toebbe was not part of the plea agreement.
