Former Los Alamos National Laboratory scientist Pedro Leonardo Mascheroni was sentenced to five years in prison and three years of supervised release for sharing classified nuclear weapons data to an undercover FBI agent. Mascheroni, 79, is alleged to have claimed that he could “deliver” a nuclear weapon to Venezuela in exchange for $793,000 during an undercover operation by the FBI. He worked at LANL from 1979 to 1988 and spent time at the lab’s famed X Division where he had access to nuclear weapons data. Mascheroni’s wife, Marjorie Roxby Mascheroni, a technical writer at the lab, was sentenced last year to one year and a day in prison for her role in the espionage plot.
The pair was indicted in 2010. “The public trusts that the government will do all it can to safeguard Restricted Data from being unlawfully transmitted to foreign nations not entitled to receive it,” Assistant Attorney General for National Security John Carlin said in a statement. “We simply cannot allow people to violate their pledge to protect the classified nuclear weapons data with which they are entrusted. Today’s sentencing should leave no doubt that counterespionage investigations remain one of our most powerful tools to protect our national security.”