Cuban Spy Who Spent Decades at Highest Levels of State Department Due for Sentencing
An alleged spy accused of one of the ‘longest-lasting infiltrations of the United States government by a foreign agent’ by Attorney General Garland is due in court Friday.
A former American diplomat and Cuban spy, Victor Manuel Rocha, is due in court Friday for sentencing after taking a plea agreement, the details of which are yet to be disclosed.
Mr. Rocha was arrested in December and charged with violations of the Foreign Agents Registration Act for failing to disclose to the attorney general’s office that he was working on behalf of Cuba. He also faces charges of conspiracy, wire fraud, and making false statements in order to obtain an American passport.
Though Mr. Rocha initially pleaded not guilty, he indicated he wanted to change his plea in late February, a change which is set to formally occur at the April 12 hearing.
At a hearing in mid-February, at the federal court for the Southern District of Florida, Mr. Rocha told Judge Beth Bloom that he wished to change his plea.
His lawyers had worked out a deal with prosecutors to agree to a sentence for two offenses — conspiracy to be an illegal agent and acting as an illegal agent of a foreign government, which could land Mr. Rocha, 73, up to 15 years behind bars.
Though Mr. Rocha was not charged with espionage, the Department of Justice did allege that he served as an undercover agent of Cuba’s General Directorate of Intelligence.
The Justice Department, in the indictment, said that Mr. Rocha used his position in the State Department and on the National Security Council during the Clinton administration to obtain sensitive information and provide that information to Cuban officials. American officials didn’t specify what information Mr. Rocha passed along.
At the February hearing, however, the details of the sentence and the plea agreement were not disclosed, though Mr. Rocha’s attorney did say that they were “fair and reasonable.”
Mr. Rocha spent around two decades serving in the State Department up until 2002, when he left to work in the private sector.
Upon his arrest, Attorney General Garland said the investigation into Mr. Rocha “exposes one of the highest-reaching and longest-lasting infiltrations of the United States government by a foreign agent.”
The arrest of Mr. Rocha elicited strong reactions from many in Florida, where Mr. Rocha was publicly known as a conservative and throughout the diplomatic community.
One former director of Citizenship and Immigration Services under President Bush, Emilio Gonzalez, called for a harsher sentence to be imposed on Mr. Rocha in a tweet.
“Rocha’s treachery will be the most damaging intelligence penetration and influence operation in U.S. history,” Mr. Gonzales said. “After completing his sentence, deport him.”