Robert Philip Hanssen (born April 18, 1944) is a former Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agent who spied for Soviet and Russian intelligence services against the United States for 22 years from 1979 to 2001. He is currently serving 15 consecutive life sentences at ADX Florence, a federal supermax prison near Florence, Colorado.
Hanssen was arrested on February 18, 2001, at Foxstone Park near his home in Vienna, Virginia, and was charged with selling U.S. secrets to the Soviet Union and subsequently the Russian Federation for more than US$1.4 million in cash and diamonds over a 22-year period.
On July 6, 2001, in order to avoid the death penalty, he pleaded guilty to 15 counts of espionage in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia. He was sentenced to 15 life terms without the possibility of parole. His activities have been described by the Department of Justice's Commission for the Review of FBI Security Programs as "possibly the worst intelligence disaster in U.S. history."
The existence of two Russian moles working in the U.S. security and intelligence establishment simultaneously—Ames at the CIA and Hanssen at the FBI—complicated counterintelligence efforts in the 1990s. Ames was arrested in 1994; his exposure explained many of the asset losses American intelligence suffered in the 1980s, including the arrest and execution of Martynov and Motorin. However, two cases—the Bloch investigation and the embassy tunnel—stood out and remained unsolved. Ames had been stationed in Rome at the time of the Bloch investigation, and could not have had knowledge of that case or of the tunnel under the embassy, as he did not work for the FBI.
The FBI and CIA formed a joint mole-hunting team in 1994 to find the suspected second intelligence leak. They formed a list of all agents known to have access to cases that were compromised. The FBI's codename for the suspected spy was "Graysuit." Some promising suspects were cleared, and the mole hunt found other penetrations such as CIA officer Harold James Nicholson. But Hanssen escaped notice.
By 1998, using FBI criminal profiling techniques, the pursuers zeroed in on an innocent man: Brian Kelley, a CIA operative involved in the Bloch investigation. The CIA and FBI searched his house, tapped his phone and put him under surveillance, following him and his family everywhere. In November 1998, they had a man with a foreign accent come to Kelley's door, warn him that the FBI knew he was a spy and tell him to show up at a Metro station the next day in order to escape. Kelley instead reported the incident to the FBI. In 1999, the FBI even interrogated Kelley, his ex-wife, two sisters and three children. All denied everything. He was eventually placed on administrative leave, where he remained falsely accused until after Hanssen was arrested.
FBI investigators later made progress when disaffected Russian intelligence officers brought forth files on "B."
Hanssen was arrested on February 18, 2001, at Foxstone Park near his home in Vienna, Virginia, and was charged with selling U.S. secrets to the Soviet Union and subsequently the Russian Federation for more than US$1.4 million in cash and diamonds over a 22-year period.
On July 6, 2001, in order to avoid the death penalty, he pleaded guilty to 15 counts of espionage in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia. He was sentenced to 15 life terms without the possibility of parole. His activities have been described by the Department of Justice's Commission for the Review of FBI Security Programs as "possibly the worst intelligence disaster in U.S. history."
The existence of two Russian moles working in the U.S. security and intelligence establishment simultaneously—Ames at the CIA and Hanssen at the FBI—complicated counterintelligence efforts in the 1990s. Ames was arrested in 1994; his exposure explained many of the asset losses American intelligence suffered in the 1980s, including the arrest and execution of Martynov and Motorin. However, two cases—the Bloch investigation and the embassy tunnel—stood out and remained unsolved. Ames had been stationed in Rome at the time of the Bloch investigation, and could not have had knowledge of that case or of the tunnel under the embassy, as he did not work for the FBI.
The FBI and CIA formed a joint mole-hunting team in 1994 to find the suspected second intelligence leak. They formed a list of all agents known to have access to cases that were compromised. The FBI's codename for the suspected spy was "Graysuit." Some promising suspects were cleared, and the mole hunt found other penetrations such as CIA officer Harold James Nicholson. But Hanssen escaped notice.
By 1998, using FBI criminal profiling techniques, the pursuers zeroed in on an innocent man: Brian Kelley, a CIA operative involved in the Bloch investigation. The CIA and FBI searched his house, tapped his phone and put him under surveillance, following him and his family everywhere. In November 1998, they had a man with a foreign accent come to Kelley's door, warn him that the FBI knew he was a spy and tell him to show up at a Metro station the next day in order to escape. Kelley instead reported the incident to the FBI. In 1999, the FBI even interrogated Kelley, his ex-wife, two sisters and three children. All denied everything. He was eventually placed on administrative leave, where he remained falsely accused until after Hanssen was arrested.
FBI investigators later made progress when disaffected Russian intelligence officers brought forth files on "B."
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