Hanssen Indictment Imminent After Talks Stall
NewsMax.com Wires
May 16, 2001
WASHINGTON -- Lawyers for accused FBI spy Robert Hanssen said they expect their client to be indicted Wednesday or Thursday after plea bargain talks stalled, The Washington Post reported on its Web site.
"The death penalty has not been removed from this case as it should be and we expect a 21-count indictment," said Plato Cacheris, Hanssen's lead attorney.
"They have had since before Feb. 19 to tell us whether or not they are going for the death penalty. They want to get us to make a proffer," Cacheris said, "but we won't do it until they make their decision on the death penalty."
Hanssen could become the first accused spy to face the death penalty since Congress restored capital punishment for espionage in 1994 following the arrest of CIA spy Aldrich H. Ames.
Ames turned over the names of more than 10 Soviet and Warsaw Pact agents working for the United States who subsequently lost their lives.
Cacheris said the negotiations became deadlocked when prosecutors demanded to know exactly what Hanssen will tell them about his alleged 15 years of spying for Moscow before they would agree to not seek the death penalty.
The FBI nabbed Hanssen Feb. 18 as he allegedly tried to exchange classified documents for $50,000 in cash at a "dead drop" in a Virginia park.
Copyright 2001 by United Press International.
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