How a former CIA officer was caught betraying his country

The officials who investigated and convicted Kevin Mallory for conspiracy to commit espionage tell CBS how their case came together
By Anderson Cooper

Kevin Mallory in surveillance footage

Kevin Mallory --  former clandestine case officer for the CIA -- was a down on his luck when he was approached by a man the Department of Justice believes was a Chinese spy. 

Officials say Mallory was a prime target for recruitment. 

He was out of work, three months behind on his mortgage, and thousands of dollars in debt. 

But as we first reported in December and as the Chinese would discover, Kevin Mallory wasn't exactly James Bond. 

The Department of Justice agreed to show us how they caught Mallory and why they believe his recruitment by China is part of a massive clandestine campaign to steal not just national security secrets from the U.S. government, but industrial and technological secrets from American companies.

This is what espionage looks like. 

The man standing on the right in the yellow shirt is Kevin Mallory, who once held a top-secret security clearance while working for the CIA and the Defense Intelligence Agency. 

Footage from a surveillance camera at a Virginia FedEx store in April 2017 caught him as he prepared to hand a clerk stacks of classified documents to be scanned onto an SD card, the kind that can be inserted into a mobile phone.
Ryan Gaynor: So this is the rare moment, right, in an investigation, in an espionage case, where we actually have video footage of the individual preparing the classified material for transmission to the foreign intelligence service. 

We watched the tape with Ryan Gaynor, the FBI supervisory special agent who investigated Mallory, and Jennifer Gellie, who prosecuted the case against him for the National Security Division of the Department of Justice. 

They say Kevin Mallory sent national security secrets to a Chinese spy on a covert communication device.
Jennifer Gellie: So here you see him talking with the store clerk about the scanning job. And throughout this video you see little pops of yellow, little yellow pieces of paper that flash by when he's showing the documents. That was important for us because the document that he successfully passed consisted of a typed-up white piece of paper, that was the classified information followed by two yellow sheets of paper with his handwriting on them. And here you can see --
Anderson Cooper: So that's the -- those are the yellow sheets of paper?
Jennifer Gellie: You can see the yellow sheets of paper going through that scanning process.
Some of the information Mallory sent could have revealed the identity of a couple who had secretly spied on China for the U.S.. 

It was a very personal betrayal. 

Mallory had supervised the couple years before.
Anderson Cooper: He was betraying people. This is people's lives at stake.
Jennifer Gellie: Correct. These were documents that specifically talked about human beings. Whose lives could be in danger.
Anderson Cooper: If they had traveled to China they could have been arrested.
John Demers: At the time he gave the information to the Chinese intelligence officer, he knew they were planning on traveling to China. John Demers

John Demers is the top official in charge of the Department of Justice's National Security Division, which helps guard the U.S. against terrorism, cyberattacks, and espionage. 

He's responsible for coordinating activities across law enforcement and U.S. intelligence agencies. 

He says Kevin Mallory's recruitment is just one of many efforts by the Chinese Ministry of State Security, or MSS, to spy on the United States.

Anderson Cooper: What is MSS?
John Demers: So MSS is the principal intelligence agency of the Chinese government. And in rough terms it is like the CIA and the FBI put together.
Their capabilities are world-class. They have cyber capabilities, they have expertise in turning people into cooperators. And they have all of the tools and expertise of a very capable intelligence organization.
Kevin Mallory hadn't worked for any U.S. intelligence agency in five years, but he was still of interest to China. 

He spoke Mandarin, was desperate for money, and had classified information he was willing to sell.
John Demers: You're looking for people who will be willing to work with you for one reason or another. You start very slowly. you start to see what information they are willing to share with you originally, innocuous information. Then something maybe slightly more sensitive and so forth. And that relationship develops over time. It's a patient process.
Anderson Cooper: It's a grooming of an intelligence asset.
John Demers: It's a grooming and it's a constant testing to see what the person is willing to do.
The Chinese didn't reach out to Kevin Mallory in a dark alley like in a movie, they made contact with him like any job recruiter would, they sent him a message on the career networking site, LinkedIn.
Anderson Cooper: What could the Chinese tell from reading his LinkedIn page?
Ryan Gaynor: When you look at this LinkedIn page, it's very clear immediately that he worked in national security, that he had the type of background that the Chinese intelligence services are most interested in.
Anderson Cooper: He's good at national security, military, international relations, counterterrorism, security clearance, dispute resolution. This is a signpost to "I was a former intelligence official."
Ryan Gaynor: And it led to what you would expect.
Mallory ended up in contact with this man, who called himself Michael Yang, and claimed to be an employee at a Chinese think tank.
Anderson Cooper: So he's a Chinese intelligence officer?
Ryan Gaynor: We believe him to be a Chinese intelligence officer and more importantly, Mallory when meeting with him believed him to be an intelligence officer.

Ryan Gaynor, the FBI supervisory special agent who investigated Mallory, and Jennifer Gellie, who prosecuted the case against him for the National Security Division of the Department of Justice.

Over the next several weeks, Michael Yang paid Mallory $25,000 to come to Shanghai twice and Mallory reached out to former colleagues at the CIA asking to be put in touch with people who had current intelligence on China. 

Prosecutors say his former colleagues grew suspicious and reported him to CIA security, putting him on the radar of law enforcement.
When Mallory returned from his second trip to China, he was stopped by customs at Chicago's O'Hare Airport. 

He had lied on this form about how much money he was carrying, more than $16,000 in cash, and agents discovered this box with a phone in it. 

Mallory claimed it was a gift for his wife but it was actually a covert communication device that had been given to him by Chinese Intelligence.

Anderson Cooper: This looks just like a regular phone. What makes it a covert communication device?
Ryan Gaynor: So it's not so much the hardware. The phone itself had a unique piece of software installed on it designed to allow secure communication both in text and also the secure transmission of documents later.
You might think a former CIA officer would be cautious about the texts he sends to a Chinese spy, but Kevin Mallory was remarkably direct, complaining about the money he was paid and the risk he was taking.
"Your object is to gain information," he told Michael Yang, "and my object is to be paid for."
"I will destroy all electronic records after you confirm receipt," Mallory wrote to Yang. 

 "I already destroyed the paper records. I cannot keep these around, too dangerous."
"At this point all the risk is on me."
Jennifer Gellie: So he says, "I'm taking all the risk." But then he goes on a few bubbles later to actually try to transmit additional information to the Chinese.
But technology wasn't Mallory's strong suit. 

 He complained to Michael Yang that the phone wasn't working properly.
"This system sucks. It's too cumbersome," he wrote. 

"I put all these messages and then and you can't read them because you are not logged in the same time, that's a poor system."

At this point, prosecutors say, Mallory was scared. 

He'd been stopped at customs and he feared the CIA and FBI were onto him. 

Prosecutors say he decided to come up with a cover story and reached out to the CIA telling them he thought he was being recruited by Chinese spies. 

The CIA called him in for an interview.Mallory is questioned.

Mallory in CIA interview clip: My judgement is, and we haven't gone through this conversation, that these guys work for Chinese intelligence… so my sense is that they were looking for government secrets. U.S. government secrets at some level.

In this meeting, Mallory admitted the phone was a covert communication device given to him by the Chinese, but prosecutors say he lied about the classified documents he'd already sent.
Interviewer in CIA interview clip: Did you send them anything on that phone?
Mallory in CIA interview clip: I sent them some tests of some sort, just to see if I could do it right. And I couldn't figure it out. I messed that up.
Ryan Gaynor: He's trying to control the narrative so what you have here likely is an attempt to steer the story, to explain away some of the more alerting pieces while not admitting to the criminal activity of providing the classified information to the foreign intelligence service.
Jennifer Gellie: We now know at this point in time Kevin Mallory has successfully sent the classified table of contents, the classified white paper, and tried to send several other documents unsuccessfully.
"We currently have three pending cases against former intelligence officers and they're alleged to have been spying on behalf of the Chinese."

Mallory offered to bring in the phone to be examined by the CIA, confident that all his messages to Michael Yang had automatically been deleted.
Anderson Cooper: So he believes, everything he's sent has disappeared from the device. So that's why he's willing to bring the device in?
Ryan Gaynor: We have every reason to believe that he believed at the time that those communications would be gone.

Two weeks later, Mallory arrived at a hotel room in Ashburn, Virginia for a second meeting with the CIA. 

When he got there, the FBI was waiting for him, along with a computer forensic examiner. 

He agreed to show them how the phone worked.
Ryan Gaynor: When he goes to demonstrate it, up on the screen where he expects to have his whole chat history basically deleted, up on the screen, comes some of the chat history.
The FBI recorded the meeting.
FBI AUDIO CLIP :
Mallory: I'm, I'm surprised it kept this much.
FBI: So, you made a comment that you were surprised that there was this much there.
Mallory: Right, 'cause you-- 'cause this, right-- 'cause, uh, in the past, uh, maybe it was the s-screen size or something 'cause some of it just disappeared.

One of the most incriminating messages that appeared on the phone was Mallory planning another trip to China. 

"I can also come in the middle of June," he wrote. 

"I can bring the remainder of the documents I have at that time."
Ryan Gaynor: From the FBI perspective, this is a pivotal moment in the investigation. 

Four weeks later, the FBI arrested Kevin Mallory and searched his home. 

Hidden in the back of this closet in a junk drawer, agents discovered an SD card wrapped in tinfoil, on which he had placed eight secret and top-secret documents, the same ones he scanned at that FedEx store in April.
Ryan Gaynor: It is our belief that it was his intention to take this SD card to China to provide to them.
Anderson Cooper: Does the Mallory case fit a pattern that you're seeing coming from Chinese intelligence?
John Demers: Yes. We currently have three pending cases against former intelligence officers and they're alleged to have been spying on behalf of the Chinese.
Anderson Cooper: It's hard to overstate how unusual it is to have three cases like this ongoing.
John Demers: It's not unusual. Its unprecedented.
Bill Evanina: To me it's disappointing and its really hurtful, I think, to everyone to know that we still have people who are willing to betray the U.S. for a few dollars.

Bill Evanina.

Bill Evanina is director of the National Counterintelligence and Security Center, a division of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. 

He serves as the U.S. government's top counterintelligence official.
Anderson Cooper: When it comes to espionage against the United States, does China pose the greatest threat or Russia?
Bill Evanina: When it comes to espionage, China poses the greatest threat. And it's not even close compared to Russia or Iran or any other country. And if you include economic espionage, industrial espionage, it's not even in the same ballgame.
Anderson Cooper: When most people think of espionage, they think of somebody in a trench coat trying to steal a state secret. What's happening now with China, it's not just about state secrets, it's about technological secrets that's the prize that China wants.
Bill Evanina: That's correct. It's trade secrets, proprietary data, intelligence, emerging technology, nanotechnology, hybrid, anything that they can see that is the future. Supercomputing, encryption, those are the issues that they look at. And they have a prioritized schedule that they look at and they send people forward to go collect that data.

John Demers, of the Justice Department's National Security Division, says since 2011, more than 90 percent of the economic espionage cases they have charged have involved China, which has stolen secrets about everything from genetically modified rice seeds to wind-turbine technology.
Anderson Cooper: This is a persistent campaign you're seeing?
John Demers: Yes, very persistent, very sophisticated. Very well-resourced, very patient and very broad in scope.
Demers says Chinese operatives have intensified their efforts on industries critical to Chinese dictator Xi Jinping's "Made in China 2025" program, a 10-year plan to jump ahead of the United States in aerospace, automation, artificial intelligence, quantum computing and other cutting edge industries.
Anderson Cooper: I think some people who see this are going to think, well this is the something the U.S. must do as well.
John Demers: The U.S. intelligence community doesn't take trade secrets from foreign companies for the benefit of American companies.
Anderson Cooper: That doesn't happen?
John Demers: This is not something that we do.
As for former CIA officer Kevin Mallory, he continues to deny sending any classified information to the Chinese. 

Last June, a jury in Virginia found him guilty of conspiracy under the Espionage Act and lying to the FBI. 

In May, Mallory was sentenced to 20 years in prison.

Portrait of an Ordinary Bastard

Kevin Mallory: The churchgoing CIA officer who spied for China
By Tara McKelveyLeesburg, Virginia

US officials say China is trying to influence US policymakers, steal secrets and spy on the US government. 

But how? 

The story of Kevin Mallory, a man who seemed to lead a typical suburban life in Virginia, provides the answer.
FBI agents pointed their weapons at Jeremiah Mallory, a teenager standing in the doorway of his house one morning in June 2017, and told him to get on his knees.
"They've got guns in his face," says Patsy Clark, a family friend. 

They were looking for evidence against his father, Kevin Mallory, a former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) officer who had been spying for the Chinese government.
One of Mallory's neighbours, a dog walker, was heading down the block: "All of a sudden I hear this yelling."
The roar of helicopters woke another neighbour, Delrose Winter, who says she saw police cars and black vans at the house. 

Cameron Norris, a student who lived nearby, saw dogs searching the yard and FBI agents carrying boxes: "They were taking equipment out - a computer."
FBI agents searched Mallory's house, a place with a red banner covered in Chinese calligraphy that hung alongside the front door, his yard and, according to neighbours, a bridle path where he used to go on runs. 

His street in Raspberry Falls, a Leesburg subdivision, looked like a war zone, with helicopters circling in the air and armed men charging through the grass.

At home, Mallory secretly communicated with Chinese agents
One year later Mallory, 61, was found guilty of espionage.
In a real-life episode of The Americans, a TV spy drama that takes place in northern Virginia, Mallory had lived a double life: he helped people on his street with yard work, went to church and assisted immigrants with income-tax forms. 

Yet at home he communicated with Chinese agents through social media and sold them US secrets.
Today he faces life in prison -- he will be sentenced later this month. 

His punishment may serve as a warning to others who may be contemplating espionage, say US justice department officials. 

It also highlights the tense nature of the US-China relationship.
A new Cold War
The US has entered a new "cold war", said the CIA's Mike Collins, deputy assistant director at the agency's East Asia mission centre, at the Aspen Security Forum last year.
Chinese officials are investing billions of US dollars in global influence operations and espionage, according to research by a former CIA analyst, Peter Mattis.
The Chinese officials are attempting to gain inside information about the White House and the government, according to US officials, and shape the way that Beijing policies and its commercial and military activities are perceived on the world stage.Loudoun County's Kristen Umstattd says she's concerned about Chinese broadcasting in Virginia
Chinese officials are attempting to sway the views of politicians and ordinary Americans so they will support policies that are favourable to Beijing on issues ranging from the South China Sea to currency manipulation.
Last month US Assistant Attorney General John Demers testified before Congress about China's "covert efforts to influence the American public".
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who previously served as CIA director, told the BBC's Gordon Corera last year that the Chinese government is trying to "infiltrate the United States with spies".

Then-CIA Director: China intent on stealing US secrets

In Beijing, state officials view the US with suspicion, and espionage is punished severely.
Between 2011-12, 10 individuals who were working undercover in China for the CIA were killed, according to the New York Times. 

"One was shot in front of his colleagues in the courtyard of a government building -- a message to others," the New York Times reporters claimed.Where Mallory went jogging
Meanwhile Xi Jinping has made it clear that influence operations in other countries are a priority for his government. 

He has done this by expanding the efforts of the United Front Work Department, according to Xinhua, the state-run news agency.
The United Front was created in the 1930s in order to marshal forces behind the Communist Party by providing a "united front" for the party among those who are living abroad.
This means that today when Chinese students in the US publicly contradict party positions, Beijing officials may inform their family in China that they have spoken out in a "subversive" manner, according to a report, Chinese Influence and American Interests.
Chinese American students say they're singled out for scrutiny by the Beijing officials and also by US officials who suspect them of being spies.
As many as one in five Chinese Americans who were accused of espionage since 2009 were never convicted, according to Andrew Kim, the author of a May 2017 report about espionage.
Party officials take to the air waves
Leesburg, a town in Loudoun County, provides a textbook example of the Communist Party's mode of operations. 

Located 40 miles from Washington, Leesburg has old-fashioned streetlamps, brick sidewalks and picket fences, evoking authentic Americana, and seems far from global conflict.
Yet Chinese agents lured Mallory, working out of his Leesburg home, into their spy ring. 

Separately Chinese officials obtained access to the airwaves of a local radio station.
The Chinese officials bought access to a Leesburg station, WCRW 1190 AM, through a subsidiary company. 

The 50,000-watt station used to be housed in a low-slung building with plate-glass windows, but the place was sold to a family several years ago.

WCRW towers in Ashburn, shown above, broadcast programmes to Washington
Under a new style of management, WCRW transmitters were moved to Ashburn, a town closer to Washington. 

The radio towers are posted on property owned by a company, Loudoun Water, near an installation of China's Zigong Lantern Festival, a traveling exhibit that was open in December. 

"They wanted a stronger signal," says Kristen Umstattd, a local official, referring to the station owners.
A former CIA analyst who has studied in Taiwan, she says that last year the station owners received permission to expand their programming hours. 

A station engineer says they now broadcast 24 hours a day. 

"I hope somebody above my pay grade is paying attention," Umstattd says.

WCRW, once located in this building, is now known as China Radio Washington
The radio signal is powerful. 

On a recent Sunday, listeners in Washington learned about Chinese satellites hurling through space and other achievements of the Beijing government. 

In contrast the news bulletins, which are produced by China Radio International, tended to strike an ominous tone when reporting on the US economy.
In addition, Chinese officials broadcast news bulletins in Philadelphia, Atlanta and other cities, according to Reuters.
The programming of WCRW and the other stations, according to the report, Chinese Influence and American Interests, are part of what is known as the Grand External Propaganda Campaign. 

Chinese broadcasters say on the station that they're offering listeners in the area "perspective" and "commentary" on news and current events so that people in the US can "learn what China is thinking and saying".
A new kind of honey trap
For the Chinese agents, Mallory was a catch. 

He has dark brown hair, a broad smile and an easy-going manner, and he does not drink alcohol or coffee. 

He had worked as a covert CIA officer and held security clearances that gave him access to the nation's most valuable secrets.
By the time he was approached by the Chinese in early 2017, though, he was working as an independent consultant and was struggling to make ends meet.
Randall Phillips, an investigator with the Mintz Group, previously served as the CIA's chief representative in China. 

Speaking on the phone from Shanghai, he says the Chinese agents tried to make Mallory feel special. "They played with the guy's vanity," says Phillips. 

It's a time-honoured technique often joked about. 

"I keep waiting for the honey trap," one CIA official said recently in a Washington bar.
The Chinese agents approached Mallory not in a bar but on LinkedIn, saying in a casual way: "Hey, will you join my network?'"
According to court records. 

Mallory replied: "I'm open to whatever. I've got to -- you know -- pay the bills."

Mallory lived next to a golf course
They told him they were looking for someone with his professional background, the same ploy they had used on European members of parliament, according to the German domestic intelligence service.
A German official says that the Chinese agents have become more perfidious on LinkedIn over the past year. 

Paul Rockwell, LinkedIn's head of trust and safety department, says they're concerned about the recruitment efforts of Chinese agents: "We are committed to stopping this behaviour."
Beijing officials dispute the Germans' account, calling it "groundless".
Living the Dream
Mallory, one of nine children, graduated from university in Utah with a political science degree and spent time in the military before working as a CIA operative. 

He lived in Iraq, China and Taiwan and married Mariah Nan Hua in Taipei.
In 2006, they bought their house in Raspberry Falls for $1.16m, with their three children, an adopted Alaskan malamute-style puppy Misty and another husky, Sierra.
Mallory and his wife spoke Chinese at home, a place decorated with brightly coloured throw pillows, a framed picture of a Mormon tabernacle and a rice cooker resting on a kitchen counter.
His own life reflected the way Americans and native Chinese speakers have come together in northern Virginia over the years. 

About 14% of the population in Loudon County is Chinese American, according to census data.
On Sundays Mallory and his wife would head to church, where he was known as Zhiping Mao. 

Many of their friends at church are native Chinese speakers -- they sing lyrics in Chinese (you can follow the English-language version in a hymnbook) in a back room.Leesburg has several Chinese businesses
Others at the church have a similar background to Mallory. 

Fluent in Chinese, these middle-aged men work for the CIA or other intelligence agencies. 

As one of Mallory's friends commented, "You can't swing a dead cat without hitting someone with a security clearance."
Mallory used to remind people in Raspberry Falls how lucky they are. 

"He'd say: 'You're living the American dream," recalls a family friend. 

"He'd tell people they should appreciate what they have."
Another friend, Delrose Winter, recalls a day when Mallory and his family came over for a Fourth of July barbecue. 

They wore red, white and blue on that Independence Day and seemed "very patriotic", she says.
But after the 2008 real estate crash, his fortunes changed. 

His house plummeted in value, and later he lost his job. 

A scientist who lives nearby, says: "They were under severe financial stress." 

Another neighbour says: "They were under water", adding: "That contributed to his desperation."Mallory struggled to support his family in Raspberry Falls
Seeking access to the White House
By the time the Chinese agents got in touch with Mallory, he had $30,000 USD in credit card debt, according to court records, and was behind in his mortgage payments.
His new acquaintance on LinkedIn introduced him to someone who worked for the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, a think-tank that provides offices for scholars and cover for intelligence agents. 

He offered Mallory a position as a consultant.
Mallory flew to Shanghai and met his new bosses in a hotel room. 

These men did not say they worked for the intelligence agency, but they did not deny it either. 

During that meeting, the hair on Mallory's neck stood up, he later said. 

He had agreed to take their money, though.
"They get you to cross a line," says Phillips, the former CIA officer. 

"Once you do, it's harder to get out."
Mallory returned to Leesburg with a Samsung Galaxy phone the Chinese had given him -- complete with a chat application by which they communicated with him.
That phone later proved to be his downfall.
When he got home, he told his wife he had concerns about his new job. 

Despite his reservations, though, he provided the Chinese with information he had obtained while working in the US intelligence services. 

According to US officials, some of the material that he gave to the Chinese was classified.
Mallory said that the agents told him: "We just want to understand what Trump administration policy is going to be."
He told the Chinese he had applied for a job in the White House, and they encouraged his efforts. 

The agents also prodded him for information about missile defence systems and other sensitive issues.Mallory placed classified material on a Toshiba SD card, shown above
But then things got really complicated for Mallory.
He texted a CIA resource officer and a covert operative, both of whom attended his church, and said he was hoping to speak to someone in the CIA's East Asia division.
He said later he was looking to tell the CIA what he was learning about the Chinese agents -- effectively becoming a double agent.
These text messages began to take on a frantic tone. 

Psychiatrist David Charney who has interviewed several convicted spies, says they realise at a certain point they "can never go home", which can lead to deep apprehension and terror.
Mallory placed classified material that he had obtained during the time that he worked for US intelligence agencies on a Toshiba SD card, wrapping it in tinfoil and stashing in his bedroom closet.
He told the Chinese agents he was worried that US authorities would discover his subterfuge: "If they were looking for me in terms of state secrets and found the SD card we would not be talking today."
A rookie spy - and a computer glitch
Mallory's lawyers said that he did nothing wrong. 

They said he was simply collecting information about Chinese espionage so he could inform the CIA about Beijing's methods. 

He hoped to impress the CIA with his knowledge of Chinese tradecraft so the CIA would hire him back.
But prosecutors presented text messages in court as evidence that he was selling US secrets: "Your object is to gain information," he texted the Chinese agents. 

"My object is to be paid."
The story of how they obtained those texts is enough to make
Mallory arranged to meet with a CIA official in an Ashburn hotel in May 2017. 

Mallory's lawyers said that he was planning to show off his knowledge of the Chinese espionage techniques. 

The prosecutors said Mallory wanted to speak with the CIA officials not to impress them with his knowledge but because he wanted to cover his tracks.
Mallory was clearly surprised when an FBI special agent also showed up for the meeting, as prosecutors later showed in court. 

The presence of the FBI agent showed that federal investigators were interested in Mallory. 

Still he carried on as if everything was fine. 

He described the way the Chinese had provided him with a secure phone. 

At this point, he assumed that his text messages would remain encrypted.Mallory texted the Chinese agents on a Samsung Galaxy that they gave him
But as he spoke, the phone crashed. 

The messages suddenly appeared on the phone's screen while he was in the room with the FBI, revealing how he had betrayed his country. 

For a long moment he said nothing. 

James Hamrock, an engineer who examined the phone for the FBI, says that Mallory was overly trusting of the phone and of the people who gave it to him. 

Unbeknownst to Mallory, the software had a glitch.
Two of the counts, both relating to where he had committed the crimes, have been dropped. 

The government is trying to get the charges reinstated. 

These two charges do not affect his sentence, however: life in prison.
Mallory wrecked his own life and cast suspicion on others. 

Many of the native Chinese speakers who live in Loudoun County are angry. 

"We're American first," says Taiwan-born Eiling Chao, who runs her own company, Choice Insurance Network, with her daughter, Stephanie Chao, and other family members. 

"If there's any spying action happening, I certainly hope the person gets punished to the fullest."

Eiling Chao, shown with Stephanie, says the US should fight hard against espionage
A jailhouse phone call
US officials have studied the crime of espionage, creating an acronym that establishes motives: MICE (money, ideology, compromise and ego). 

It's true that Mallory wanted to make money from the Chinese, but in the end it was not much: he earned $25,000 USD from his spy work.
Mallory's house is now on the market: a short sale, it's listed at $740,000 and has lost more than a third of its value. 

The Chinese banner has been taken down. 

Misty and Sierra still lie on a patch of woodchips in the yard on sunny afternoons. 

They barely look up when a mailman comes.
Mallory is being held in the Alexandria Detention Center in Virginia, and he is waiting for his sentencing. 

He was in the courtroom on an autumn morning, and he wore Velcro sneakers, white socks and a prison jumpsuit, and his face was ashen.
During a phone call to his daughter from jail, he tried to explain why he had been arrested. 

"Your mom knows I've been all up front with all this kind of stuff with the CIA," he said and, referring to the FBI agents, said: "Somehow these other guys twisted things around a little bit." 

He said: "Things get complicated sometimes."

The jury wrote a note to the judge, stating their verdict

Mallory's wife, "an absolute rock", as a friend describes her, is now driving a school bus. 

Jeremiah leads the church group in prayer and has the grace that comes from years of studying ballet. 

He is getting ready to go on a two-year missionary in Australia, following his brother, Michael, 22, who is there now. 

Jeremiah wrote to the court in October and asked if he could hug his father before he leaves: "It would be an unforgettable blessing to have a last moment with my Dad."
Many of the Americans who have committed treason were once model citizens who went into a downward spiral and thought espionage would help them turn things around. 

Behind bars they still see themselves as "patriotic", says David Charney, the psychiatrist. 

That seems to be true with Mallory: he calls his friend Patsy Clark from jail, and she says he remains loyal to the US.
"They were never hating the US," Charney said in a Washington lecture: "Their only beef was with themselves." 

He added: "Weirdly enough, they're still good Americans."