DOJ: State Dept. Employee Charged With Lying About Chinese Intel Contacts

File - The Harry S. Truman Building, headquarters for the State Department, is seen in Washington, in this March 9, 2009 file photo. A retired State Department worker, Walter Kendall Myers and his wife Gwendolyn St... File - The Harry S. Truman Building, headquarters for the State Department, is seen in Washington, in this March 9, 2009 file photo. A retired State Department worker, Walter Kendall Myers and his wife Gwendolyn Steingraber Myers, have been arrested on charges of spying for Cuba for three decades, using grocery carts among their array of tools to pass U.S. secrets to the communist government in a security breach one official described as "incredibly serious." The indictment was unsealed Friday June 5, 2009. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File) MORE LESS
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The Department of Justice announced Wednesday that a State Department employee had been arrested for obstructing an official proceeding and lying to the FBI, in relation to an investigation of her contacts with and acceptance of gifts from foreign intelligence officials.

The Justice employee, Candace Marie Claiborne, had a top secret security clearance and had served overseas in Iraq, Sudan and China since she began working at State in 1999, according to an affidavit the DOJ cited in its announcement of the charges.

Claiborne, the Justice Department claimed, failed to report contacts with two Chinese intelligence agents despite their providing her with thousands of dollars worth of gifts, including, according to the affidavit, cash, “an Apple iPhone and laptop computer, Chinese New Year’s gifts, meals, international travel and vacations, tuition at a Chinese fashion school, a fully furnished apartment, and a monthly stipend.” The affidavit alleged that a co-conspirator accepted some of the gifts as well.

The affidavit noted, according to the Justice Department, that Claiborne wrote in a journal that she could “Generate 20k in 1 year” by working with the Chinese officials, one of whom asked her to send them U.S. government analyses of a recent economic summit between the two nations after wiring her $2,480.

Claiborne pleaded not guilty to the charges on Wednesday, the Justice Department noted, and faces a preliminary hearing on April 18.

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