Diana Toebbe, the wife in the husband-and-wife duo sentenced for conspiracy charges related to nuclear warships, has an appeal pending in a West Virginia federal district court, a document says.
Diana and her husband Jonathan Toebbe, a naval nuclear engineer in the Naval Nuclear Propulsion Program, are a Maryland couple sentenced in 2022 for allegedly conspiring to communicate restricted data on the nuclear-powered Virginia-class submarine design to a foreign government.
The couple reportedly used Jonathan’s security clearance to sell “highly sensitive information related to nuclear-powered warships,” according to Department of Justice archives. Meanwhile, Diana reportedly would act as a lookout at locations where a memory card containing sensitive information would be left behind.
A document from the case said in April Diana petitioned the Northern District Court of West Virginia “vacate, correct, or set aside” her sentence on grounds her counsel did not inform her the “full range of consequences” when advising her to take a guilty plea. The couple pled guilty to conspiracy in August 2022, and Jonathan was sentenced to over 19 years in prison while Diana was sentenced to over 21 years.
The document said Diana’s counsel “incorrectly” told her if she pled guilty, the sentence would “likely be nine years,” or less than half what the court ended up giving her, and be “capped” at 12 years.
Seven months later, the judge has not ruled on the motion.