The
U.S. Justice Department released the below information:
Victor
Manuel Rocha, 73, of Miami, a former U.S. Department of State employee who
served on the National Security Council from 1994 to 1995 and as U.S.
Ambassador to Bolivia from 2000 to 2002, pleaded guilty today to secretly
acting for decades as an agent of the government of the Republic of Cuba.
Immediately thereafter, a federal judge sentenced Rocha to the statutory
maximum penalty of 15 years in prison.
“Today’s plea and sentencing brings to an end more than four
decades of betrayal and deceit by the defendant,” said Assistant Attorney
General Matthew G. Olsen of the Justice Department’s National Security
Division. “Rocha admitted to acting as an agent of the Cuban government at the
same time he held numerous positions of trust in the U.S. government, a
staggering betrayal of the American people and an acknowledgement that every
oath he took to the United States was a lie."
“Victor Manuel Rocha secretly acted for decades as an agent of a
hostile foreign power. He thought the story of his covert mission for Cuba
would never be told because he had the intelligence, knowledge, and discipline
to never to be detected. Rocha underestimated those same skills in the
prosecutors and law enforcement agents who worked tirelessly to bring him to
justice for betraying his oath to this country,” said U.S. Attorney Markenzy
Lapointe for the Southern District of Florida. “I am mindful that Rocha’s
decades-long criminal activity on behalf of the Cuban Government is especially
painful for many in South Florida. Rocha’s willingness to cooperate, as
required by his plea agreement, is important, but does not change the
seriousness of his misconduct or his clandestine breach of the trust placed in
him. Rocha’s 15-year prison sentence, the maximum punishment for his crimes of
conviction, sends a powerful message to those who are acting or seek to act
unlawfully in the United States for a foreign government: we will seek you out
anywhere, at any time, and prosecute you to the fullest extent of the law.”
U.S. District Court Judge Beth Bloom accepted Rocha’s guilty
plea to counts 1 and 2 of the indictment, which charged him with conspiring to
act as an agent of a foreign government and conspiring to defraud the United
States and acting as an agent of a foreign government without notice as
required by law.
The court then sentenced Rocha to the statutory maximum penalty
on his counts of conviction: 15 years in prison, a $500,000 fine, three years
of supervised release and a special assessment. The court also imposed
significant restrictions on Rocha.
Under the terms of the parties’ plea agreement, Rocha must
cooperate with the United States, including assisting with any damage
assessment related to his work on behalf of the Republic of Cuba. Rocha must
relinquish all future retirement benefits, including pension payments, owed to
him by the United States based upon his former State Department employment.
Rocha must also assign to the United States any profits that he may be entitled
to receive in connection with any publication relating to his criminal conduct
or his U.S. Government service.
“Despite swearing an oath to defend the Constitution of the
United States, Rocha betrayed the U.S. by secretly working as a Cuban agent for
decades,” said Executive Assistant Director Larissa L. Knapp of the FBI’s
National Security Branch. “After years of lying and endangering national
security and U.S. citizens, he finally accepted responsibility for his actions
and received the maximum prison sentence. This should serve as a notice to our
adversaries that the FBI will work tirelessly to stop foreign intelligence
services and any who work with them against the interests of the United States
and prosecute them to the fullest extent of the law.”
“Victor Manuel Rocha was sentenced to 15 years in prison today
for deceiving our nation,” said Special Agent in Charge Jeffrey B. Veltri of
the FBI Miami Field Office. “He blatantly violated the oath of office he
willingly took as an employee of the State Department and disregarded the
loyalty to the United States that is inherent with that oath. As this case
demonstrates, the counterintelligence threat facing our nation is real,
pervasive, and has the potential to cause great harm to our national security.
I want to commend the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of
Florida for their close partnership on this highly sensitive matter. I also
want to thank our Washington Field Office and our Counterintelligence Division,
as well as the Department of Justice’s National Security Division and the
Department of State’s Diplomatic Security Service for their valuable
contributions to this case.”
“The investigation of this crime demonstrates the sustained
threat from hostile intelligence services,” said Assistant Director for
Domestic Operations Andrew Wroblewski of the U.S. Department of State’s
Diplomatic Security Service (DSS). “Today’s guilty plea and sentencing are
another example of our commitment to successfully work together with our
federal law enforcement partners in the pursuit of those who compromise the
security of the United States.”
In pleading guilty, Rocha admitted that, beginning in 1973, and
continuing to the time of his arrest, he secretly supported the Republic of
Cuba and its clandestine intelligence-gathering mission against the United
States by serving as a covert agent of Cuba’s General Directorate of
Intelligence.
By his own admission, to further that role, Rocha obtained
employment at the U.S. Department of State, where he worked between 1981 and
2002, in positions that provided him access to nonpublic information, including
classified information, and the ability to affect U.S. foreign policy. Aside
from serving as the U.S. Ambassador to Bolivia and on the White House National
Security Council, Rocha’s career included a stint as Deputy Principal Secretary
of the State Department’s U.S. Interests Section in Havana, Cuba from 1995-97.
After his State Department employment ended, Rocha engaged in other acts
intended to support Cuba’s intelligence services.
Rocha kept his status as a Cuban agent secret to protect himself
and others and to allow himself the opportunity to engage in additional
clandestine activity. Rocha provided false and misleading information to the
United States to maintain his secret mission and traveled outside the United
States to meet with Cuban intelligence operatives.
In a series of meetings during 2022 and 2023, with an undercover
FBI agent posing as a covert Cuban General Directorate of Intelligence
representative, Rocha made repeated statements admitting his “decades” of work
for Cuba, spanning “40 years.” When the undercover told Rocha he was “a covert
representative here in Miami” whose mission was “to contact you, introduce
myself as your new contact, and establish a new communication plan,” Rocha
answered “Yes,” and proceeded to engage in lengthy conversations during which
he described and celebrated his activity as a Cuban intelligence agent.
Throughout the meetings, Rocha behaved as a Cuban agent, consistently referring
to the United States as “the enemy,” and using the term “we” to describe
himself and Cuba. Rocha additionally praised Fidel Castro as the “Comandante,”
and referred to his contacts in Cuban intelligence as his “Compañeros”
(comrades) and to the Cuban intelligence services as the “Dirección.” Rocha
described his work as a Cuban agent as “enormous … More than a grand slam,” and
asserted that what he did “strengthened the Revolution … immensely.”
The FBI Miami Field Office investigated the case, with valuable
contributions by the FBI Washington Field Office and the U.S. Department of
State’s Diplomatic Security Service (DSS).
Assistant U.S. Attorneys Jonathan D. Stratton and John C. Shipley for the Southern District of Florida and Trial Attorneys Heather M. Schmidt and Christine A. Bonomo of the National Security Division’s Counterintelligence and Export Control Section prosecuted the case.
You can also read my Counterterrorism magazine piece on Rocha and how the FBI caught the Cuban spies via the below link:
Paul Davis On Crime: My Counterterrorism Magazine Piece On How The FBI Caught The Traitorous Cuban Spies
No comments:
Post a Comment