The Toronto Sun reported that an electrical engineering professor from the University of California, Los Angeles has been found guilty by a jury of sending stolen U.S military technology to China.
On June 26 the 64-year-old professor, Yi-Chi Shih, was convicted on 18 federal charges, meaning he now faces fines of hundreds of thousands of dollars and up to 219 years in prison, as Newsweek reported.
News release from the Department of Justice show that the charges included conspiracy to break the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), committing mail and wire fraud, subscribing to a false tax return, making false statements to a government agency, and conspiring to gain unauthorized access to information on a protected computer.
Campus Reform reported that the professor has been serving as an adjunct prof. at the University of California and while he faces prison time, his sentencing hearing has not been set yet.
Assistant Attorney General Demers stated in the news release that “the defendant has been found guilty of conspiring to export sensitive semiconductor chips with military applications to China.”
“This defendant schemed to export to China semiconductors with military and civilian uses, then he lied about it to federal authorities and failed to report income generated by the scheme on his tax returns.” United States Attorney Nick Hanna stated.
Semiconductor chips called monolithic microwave integrated circuits are used in a variety of military tech including missiles, fighter jets, missile guidance systems, electronic warfare and countermeasures, radar applications etc.
