Vincent Kessler | Reuters
A Recent York man was sentenced on Tuesday to 2 years in prison for conspiring to steal General Electric‘s trade secrets to profit China, the U.S. Justice Department said.
Xiaoqing Zheng, 59, of Niskayuna, Recent York, was convicted of conspiracy to commit economic espionage following a four-week jury trial that resulted in March last yr, based on the Justice Department. U.S. District Judge Mae D’Agostino also sentenced Zheng to pay a $7,500 tremendous and serve one yr of post-imprisonment supervised release.
U.S. officials have said the Chinese government poses the largest long-term threat to U.S. economic and national security, and is carrying out unprecedented efforts to steal critical technology from U.S. businesses and researchers. China denies the allegations.
Zheng was employed at GE Power in Schenectady, Recent York, as an engineer specializing in turbine sealing technology. He worked at GE from 2008 until the summer of 2018, the Justice Department said.
The trial evidence showed Zheng and others in China conspired to steal GE’s trade secrets surrounding its ground-based and aviation-based turbine technologies to profit China, including China-based firms and universities that research and manufacture parts for turbines, the Justice Department added.
“This can be a case of textbook economic espionage. Zheng exploited his position of trust, betrayed his employer and conspired with the federal government of China to steal revolutionary American technology,” said Assistant Attorney General Matthew Olsen of the Justice Department’s national security division.
The USA had accused the previous GE engineer and one other Chinese businessman named Zhaoxi Zhang in 2019 of stealing secrets and spying on GE to help China. Zheng had pleaded not guilty on the time.
A U.S. federal court in Cincinnati sentenced a Chinese national in November to twenty years in prison after he was convicted of plotting to steal trade secrets from several U.S. aviation and aerospace firms.
