Ex-student guilty of spying for China

CHICAGO — A former graduate student has been convicted of spying for the Chinese government by gathering information on scientists and engineers in the U.S. with knowledge of aerospace and other technology.

A federal jury in Chicago convicted Ji Chaoqun, 31, on Monday of conspiracy to act as an agent of China’s Ministry of State Security without notifying the U.S. attorney general, acting as a spy in the U.S., and lying on a government form about his contacts with foreign agencies.

The jury, which deliberated about six hours over two days, acquitted Ji of two other wire fraud counts alleging that he lied to the U.S. Army when he applied to become a reservist in 2016, the Chicago Tribune reported.

Ji, a Chinese national who has been in custody since he was arrested in September 2018, showed no reaction as he listened to the verdict on headphones through a Chinese interpreter.

A federal judge did not immediately set a sentencing date for Ji, who could face as much as 10 years in prison for his conviction for acting as an unregistered Chinese agent.

The prosecution alleged that Ji was targeted by agents of the Ministry of State Security shortly before he came to the U.S. in 2013 to study engineering at the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago.