Ana Montes
Ana Montes | |
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FMC Carswell |
Ana Belén Montes
Montes was arrested on September 21, 2001, and she subsequently was charged with conspiracy to commit espionage for the government of Cuba. Montes pleaded guilty to spying and, in October 2002, was sentenced to a 25-year prison term to be followed by five-years' probation.[3][4] She was released on January 6, 2023, after having served behind bars for 20 years.[5]
Early life and career
Montes was born in
Montes's brother and sister, Tito and Lucy, became Federal Bureau of Investigation employees.[4] Tito was an FBI special agent,[4] and Lucy was a longtime FBI language analyst and translator.[4][2] Ana Montes's former boyfriend, Roger Corneretto, was an intelligence officer specializing in Cuba for the Pentagon.[4]
Montes joined the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) in September 1985 after having worked for the United States Department of Justice. Her first assignment was at Bolling Air Force Base in Washington, where she worked as an intelligence research specialist. In 1992, Montes was selected for the DIA's Exceptional Analyst Program, and she later traveled to Cuba to study the Cuban military.[4]
Prior to her arrest, she lived in a two-bedroom co-op apartment in the Cleveland Park neighborhood of Washington, D.C.[4]
Montes advanced rapidly through the ranks at the DIA and became its most senior Cuban analyst.[6] Her co-workers regarded her as responsible and dependable, and they noted her "no-nonsense" attitude. Prosecutors later would allege that Montes already was working for the Cubans when she joined the DIA in 1985.[4]
Espionage
Montes had been recruited by Cuban intelligence while she was a university student at Johns Hopkins University in the 1980s. She became known to other students for her strong opinions in support of left-wing Latin American movements like the Sandinista National Liberation Front in Nicaragua. A Cuban agent eventually approached her. After recruiting her, the Cuban Intelligence Service groomed her to pursue employment with the Defense Intelligence Agency.[7][4]
In their charging documents, federal prosecutors stated:[4]
Montes communicated with the Cuban Intelligence Service through encrypted messages and received her instructions through shortwave encrypted transmissions from Cuba. In addition, Montes communicated by coded numeric pager messages with the Cuban Intelligence Service by public telephones located in the District of Columbia and Maryland. The codes included 'I received message' or 'danger.'
The prosecutors further stated that all of the information was on water-soluble paper that could be destroyed rapidly.
During the course of the investigation against her, it was determined that Montes had passed a considerable amount of classified information to the
Carmichael, who had led the DIA investigation of Montes, named her as being directly responsible for the death of
Carmichael further alleged that, unlike many in the U.S. intelligence community, he believed that Montes's penetration of the DIA was not the exception, but the rule, and that the Cuban intelligence services had multiple spies and moles within U.S. intelligence agencies.[8]
In 2004, a federal indictment alleged that Montes had assistance from another Cuban agent, Marta Rita Velázquez, who had been a legal officer at the United States Agency for International Development and was further alleged to have recruited Montes into espionage. The federal indictment was unsealed in April 2013. Velázquez has been outside the United States since 2002, apparently in Sweden, which does not have an extradition treaty with the United States for spy cases.[9]
Arrest
Montes was arrested by the
In 2002, Montes pleaded guilty to the charge that could have carried the
Incarceration
Montes was incarcerated at
Montes is listed as FMC Register #25037-016. She was released on January 6, 2023.[12] Having been released, she will be monitored, including her internet usage, for five years. Montes will not be allowed to contact "foreign agents" or work for the U.S. government "without permission".[13]
She is currently living in Puerto Rico and continues to speak out against U.S. sanctions against Cuba.[14]
See also
Further reading
- Popkin, Jim (January 3, 2023). Code Name Blue Wren: The True Story of America's Most Dangerous Female Spy—and the Sister She Betrayed. Harlequin. ISBN 978-0-3697-3423-5.[15]
- Carmichael, Scott (October 1, 2009). True Believer: Inside the Investigation and Capture of Ana Montes, Cuba's Master Spy. Naval Institute Press. ISBN 978-1-61251-253-2.
- "FBI 100 The Case of the Cuban Spy". Federal Bureau of Investigation.
- Marquis, Christopher (October 20, 2001). "U.S. Restricts Cuban Diplomats in Capital After Spy Charges". The New York Times. Retrieved January 27, 2014.
- Undersecretary of State John Bolton, CBS News interview, May 11, 2002
- Manuel, Cereijo. "Ana Belen Montes: The chronicle of an American Spy for the Cuban Government". LatinAmericanStudies.org.
- "Statement by Ana Belen Montes, who received 25-year sentence for spying for Cuba". Miami Herald. October 16, 2002 – via LatinAmericanStudies.org.
References
- ^ a b Iglesias, María José (April 28, 2013). "Ana Montes, la asturiana que espió para Fidel". La Nueva España (in Spanish). Retrieved August 7, 2016.
- ^ a b c d Popkin, Jim (December 22, 2014). "Two double agents, a prison swap and the code from outer space: did this spy-v-spy duel save US-Cuban relations". The Guardian.
- ^ "An Unrepentant Montes Sentenced to 25 Years". cicentre.com. The Centre for Counterintelligence and Security Studies. October 16, 2002. Archived from the original on August 7, 2007.
- ^ Washington Post Magazine. Retrieved August 7, 2016.
- ^ "Cuba spy Ana Belen Montes released after 20 years behind bars". Reuters. January 7, 2023. Retrieved January 7, 2023.
- ^ "Ana Montes: Cuban Spy". Federal Bureau of Investigation. Retrieved January 24, 2018.
- ^ ISBN 978-1-59-114100-6.
- ^ a b c d Gertz, Bill (March 14, 2007). "DIA official warns about Cuban spies". The Washington Times. Retrieved August 7, 2016.
- ^ "Charge in Cuban spy case unsealed, accusing ex-State Dept. officer of conspiracy". The Washington Post. Associated Press. April 25, 2013. Archived from the original on April 26, 2013.
- ^ "Cuba spy Ana Belen Montes released after 20 years behind bars". Reuters. January 7, 2023. Retrieved September 10, 2023.
- ^ Latell, Brian (August 2, 2014). "New revelations about Cuban spy Ana Montes". Miami Herald. Archived from the original on April 19, 2015. Retrieved August 7, 2016.
- ^ "Federal Bureau of Prisons Inmate Locator". Federal Bureau of Prisons. United States Department of Justice. Retrieved April 18, 2020.
BOP Register Number: 25037-016
- ^ Murphy, Matt (January 8, 2023). "Ana Montes: Top spy freed in US after more than 20 years". BBC. Retrieved January 8, 2023.
- ^ Bailey, Chelsea "Ana Montes: How Cuban spy used incredible memory to betray US" BBC News (Jan. 11, 2023) (accessed Jan. 11, 2023)
- ^ "Transcript: Jim Popkin, Author "Code Name Blue Wren"". Washington Post. Retrieved January 15, 2023.