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Former FBI Agent Turned Russian Spy Dies in Prison PHOTOS/FBI
WASHINGTON – Robert Hanssen (79), former agent FBI who became a spy Russia , was found dead in his prison cell, Monday (5/6/2023). Hanssen’s betrayal was the most damaging in FBI history.
As Reuters reports, Hanssen was sentenced to life in prison in 2002 after pleading guilty to spying for the Soviet Union and then Russia for more than 20 years.
“Prison staff initiated rescue measures after finding Hanssen unresponsive early Monday morning, to no avail,” the Bureau of Prisons said in a statement. The bureau did not provide a cause of death.
Hanssen joined the FBI in 1976 and began selling classified information to the Soviet Union in 1985, according to the FBI’s website.
At the time of his arrest in 2001, he had been compensated for more than $1.4 million in cash, bank funds and diamonds, in exchange for sacrificing much of U.S. human resources, intelligence engineering and classified documents, the FBI website said.
FBI investigators worked for years trying to identify spies in their ranks. In the weeks leading up to his arrest in February 2001, about 300 personnel were working on Hanssen’s investigation and monitoring, according to the FBI.
An arrest team detained Hanssen after catching him creating “dead drip” from classified material in a suburban Virginia park, the FBI said. He has been serving a life sentence in a maximum security facility in Colorado.
(esn)
