He was 79 years old and had been in jail since 2001. The FBI states on its website that he was the most damaging spy in the agency’s history.
robert hansen A former FBI agent who was the most damaging spy in United States history by leaking top-secret information to Moscow’s secret services for years In the midst of the Cold War, he was found dead in his cell on Monday. Hansen, 79, was arrested in 2001 and pleaded guilty to selling highly classified material to the Soviet Union and then to Russia. He was serving a life sentence in federal prison in Florence, Colorado.
Christy Brashers, communications director for the Bureau of Prisons, said the detective was found unconscious in the morning and efforts to revive him were unsuccessful.
Hansen’s Detective Story It is remembered as one of the most reprehensible incidents of the 20th century. And the totality of the information leaked by him will never be revealed. But all the experts agree that it, like some others, caused damage. The FBI says on its website, “He was the most damaging spy in the agency’s history.”
Three years after being hired by the FBI, Hansen became close to the Soviets and in 1979 began spying for the KGB and its successor, the SVR. He stopped when his wife discovered him with a pile of money a few years later and confronted him.
Hassan was a devout Catholic, the father of 6 children, and his wife sent him to atone for his sins with a priest, who advised him to donate money and thereby atone.
But Hasan, greedy for money, could not keep calm for long and wanted more. He resumed espionage in 1985, Sale of thousands of classified documents Compromising human and technical sources and counterintelligence investigations in exchange for over $1.4 million in cash, diamonds and foreign bank deposits.
Under the alias “Ramon Garcia”, he passed information to spy agencies using covert communications and camouflaged envelopes, without ever meeting any Russian facilitators. He would announce his deliveries with adhesive tape markings in some places and on some day and time he would deposit garbage bags with secret information under a bridge in and around Washington.
His job at the FBI gave him unrestricted access to classified information regarding the Bureau’s counterintelligence operations. His revelations included US nuclear war preparations and details of a secret listening tunnel under the Soviet embassy in Washington, DC. he also betrayed double agents including Soviet General Dmitri Polyakov, who was later executed.
“The information you provided has compromised numerous human resources, counterintelligence techniques, investigations, dozens of highly classified United States government documents, and technical operations of extraordinary importance and value,” the FBI said.
Hansen was arrested after trying Send a hidden message to 200 in a Virginia park1 the FBI had been secretly monitoring him for months.
When he was arrested, he only asked his FBI colleagues: “Why did it take so long?” One of the events that vindicated Hansen during those years was the arrest of another double spy, Aldrich Ames, a CIA agent who had also provided information from that agency to the Russians. Everything Hansen had leaked was attributed to Ames, until he realized that some didn’t come off.
The FBI suspected he had a mole in his gut, but they couldn’t find it until they put a price on his head, a bait planted by a Russian spy who decided to expose his activities, even though He didn’t know her real name. Thus, his identity was discovered after a Russian intelligence officer handed him a file containing a garbage bag with Hansen’s fingerprints. A recording of your voice.
Hansen was facing 15 consecutive counts of life in prison. His case months later led to the formation of a Security Review Commission for FBI Programs. That commission described Hansen’s espionage as “arguably the worst intelligence disaster in American history”.
