Kenneth Ellman

Kenneth Ellman Reviews My Country Versus Me. Box 18, Newton, New Jersey 07860. Email: Ke@kennethellman.com Sept 12, 2016.
“ I sincerely apologize to you, Dr. Lee, for the unfair manner you were held in custody by the executive branch”, Judge James Parker, U.S.D.C. , so this book begins and ends.
I read this book by Wen Ho Lee many years ago and found that it simply recounted and revealed another tragedy of failure by our Government. This is one story of many such failures, such as the Prosecution of deceased Senator Ten Stevens.
Many people do not remember this Lee Prosecution. It is not long ago having occurred in 1998/1999 period and received very wide publicity at that time. Yet it’s significance and what it revealed may never have been fully appreciated then or now. The author Engineer Wen Ho Lee, Ph.D., was a long time employee of Los Alamos National Laboratory working as a scientist concerned with Nuclear Weapons development. In 1998/1999 he was investigated and prosecuted under an Indictment from the United States District Court, District of New Mexico:
CRIMINAL NO. 99-1417
42 U.S.C. § 2276: Tampering,
Altering, Concealing and Removing
Restricted Data, 42 U.S.C.§ 2275;
Receipt of Restricted Data; 18 U.S.C.
§ 793(c): Unlawful Gathering of National
Defense Information; 18 U.S.C.§
793(e): Unlawful Retention of National
Defense Information.

This indictment in and of itself alleging a threat to national security/espionage is not unusual or extraordinary. There have been other notorious U.S. Government employees, including F.B. I. Agent Robert Philip Hanssen and C.I.A Officer Aldrich Hazen Ames who have been convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment for aiding enemies of the United States/Espionage.

What is extraordinary about the case of Wen Ho Lee is the revealing of the incompetence and dishonesty of the U.S. Government employees responsible for his Prosecution. The failed case brought out that members of the Prosecution misled the Court, probably committed perjury, created fear of compromise of U.S. Defense that simply did not exist from Wen Ho Lee and to compound the failure apparently never apprehended the actual spy/offender. They did all of this while keeping Wen Ho Lee in solitary confinement without bail for 278 days until September 13, 2000. Out of the original 59 counts in the Indictment, Lee pled guilty to one and was released.
His Guilty Plea did not involve any Espionage or Spying. The US Government settled a lawsuit he brought against the Government and news organizations, reportedly paying him a total of $1.6 Million Dollars.

The initial cause of the Investigation was that CHINA (PRC) had in fact obtained information about US Nuclear Warheads. However Investigation of that serious security failure revealed that the Espionage could not have come from Wen Ho Lee and came from another source. It appears that the FBI never discovered who had in fact compromised that Nuclear Warhead information but Wen Ho Lee was certainly not the person in that incident.
However grounds for concern about Wen Ho Lee arose in 1982, when Wen Ho Lee was recorded in a conversation with a Taiwanese-American scientist who had been suspected of espionage. Lee apparently was going to help this suspected Spy find out how the FBI discovered his activities. When initially confronted by the FBI about this conversation, Wen Ho Lee denied it, he being unaware that it was tape recorded evidence. Even though that denial by Lee was certainly grounds for further investigation, the FBI apparently closed its investigation of Lee in 1984.
In 1994, a delegation of Chinese scientists visited Los Alamos National Laboratory. Chinese scientist Dr. Hu Side, the head of China’s nuclear program was one of the visitors. During the Chinese delegation visit, Wen Ho Lee joined the meeting and engaged in conversations with Dr. Hu Side in a manner that showed they had a previous acquaintance and relationship. Most strange is that if the relationship between Wen Ho Lee and Dr. Side involved Espionage, why, why, would Wen Ho Lee publically greet Dr. Side in such a manner. Yet he in fact did, which of course revealed this unknown relationship between them.

Certainly the previous 1982 recording and now this 1994 behavior by Wen Ho Lee would be grounds for investigation, particularly since any relationship with Dr. Hu Side should have been previously disclosed to the Los Alamos Laboratory as a security requirement.
In spite of these 1982 and 1994 incidents, Lee continued his work at Los Alamos until 1998 when the FBI investigation caused his termination and later Prosecution.

The conduct of the Prosecution of Wen Ho Lee was a disaster and should be required reading in every law enforcement training program as to how NOT to conduct a case. The result was that all but one charge was dropped against Lee, Lee was mistreated while in custody, there never was any justification to keep Lee in 278 Days of solitary, the FBI lied to the Court and we still do not know, as far as I can tell, how the Nuclear Warhead information was obtained by the Chinese.

China, then and today is engaged in Espionage against the United States. If they can hurt us they will. Perhaps China will change one day, but so far they have not. The FBI and other agencies are charged with protecting our national security. We can only hope that the incompetence and dishonesty shown in the Prosecution of Wen Ho Lee will be taught so not to be repeated. In addition to this well done account by Wen Ho Lee, you should read the May 2000 Randy Bellows/ Attorney General report of review of the Prosecution.
The danger to our nation does not come from our enemies, but from the incompetence of those in our government charged with our protection and defense. Why we allow this I will never know. Kenneth Ellman, Box 18, Newton, New Jersey 07860, Email: ke@kennethellman.com