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FBI and DOJ Drop Case Against Chinese-American Physicist
Required Snark writes: The FBI and Department of Justice have withdrawn their prosecution (or more accurately persecution) Dr. Xi Xiaoxing, former head of the Physics Department at Temple University, according to the New York Times. He was accused of attempting to transfer technology about a "pocket heater" to China. It is used in superconducting research.
The case fell apart because the evidence that the FBI had was not about a pocket heater. "In a sworn affidavit, one engineer, Ward S. Ruby, said he was uniquely qualified to identify a pocket heater. 'I am very familiar with this device, as I was one of the co-inventors,' he said." Apparently nobody in the FBI or DOJ bothered to verify that the information referred to the device in question: "Dr. Xi's lawyer, Peter Zeidenberg, said that despite the complexity, it appeared that the government never consulted with experts before taking the case to a grand jury. As a result, prosecutors misconstrued the evidence, he said."
Dr Xi was forced to step down from his position as the head of the department during the investigation. He was unable to work on his ongoing experiments and was branded a spy. What are the odds that anyone at the FBI or DOJ will face any personal or professional repercussions? If recent history is any guide they will not even issue a statement. When the case was withdrawn the option to refile was retained, a blatant attempt to save face and deny responsibility.
The case fell apart because the evidence that the FBI had was not about a pocket heater. "In a sworn affidavit, one engineer, Ward S. Ruby, said he was uniquely qualified to identify a pocket heater. 'I am very familiar with this device, as I was one of the co-inventors,' he said." Apparently nobody in the FBI or DOJ bothered to verify that the information referred to the device in question: "Dr. Xi's lawyer, Peter Zeidenberg, said that despite the complexity, it appeared that the government never consulted with experts before taking the case to a grand jury. As a result, prosecutors misconstrued the evidence, he said."
Dr Xi was forced to step down from his position as the head of the department during the investigation. He was unable to work on his ongoing experiments and was branded a spy. What are the odds that anyone at the FBI or DOJ will face any personal or professional repercussions? If recent history is any guide they will not even issue a statement. When the case was withdrawn the option to refile was retained, a blatant attempt to save face and deny responsibility.
Just remember everyone, the problem isn't our intelligence services, it's America's "deep cynicism" over our intelligence services!
So.. what was he sending schematics of? The article just has a statement from his lawyer that "The technology discussed was not sensitive or restricted"
No, the story is that the intelligence agencies in America are big lumbering giants swatting at everything that moves rather than actually knowing and targeting what they're looking for, at the expense of our freedoms as citizens.
Exactly. Now, how hard would it have been to find some knowledgeable physicists with decent security clearances to run this by? Might have taken a couple of days. Even a week. The horror.
And why the fuck did they SWAT team the guy? Do they think he has a tachyon deflector in his pocket and that turns FBI agents into primordial soup?
Yep, this is exactly why we don't 'trust' the Powers That Be. Once they act like full grown adults for a while, maybe be can restart the discussion.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
Be that as it may, I don't think it's ignorance of science that's the issue. You could be very, very scientifically literate in general and have no ability to figure out what any of the gobbledygook in question means.
The thing is, the investigators and prosecutors ought to have *known* that. Because they deal with so many different kinds of things one of their core competencies should be realizing they have no freaking idea what they're looking at; and another should be finding expert consultants who can tell them what it *is* they're looking at. So at the very least we are looking at stunning incompetence in our federal investigators.
But there's more to this. There's a long history in the US of really fucked-up investigations of Chinese-American physicists, going all the way back to Qian Xuesen, the founder of JPL. That a paranoid witchhunt which addressed the imaginary problem of Chinese rocket spying by exiling one of America's best rocket science minds -- to China.
So scientific ignorance notwithstanding I think we're looking at the confluence of racism and incompetence. And the fact that China actually does technological espionage, although that doesn't mean that Chinese physicists are somehow genetically programmed to serve their ancestral motherland.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
And why the fuck did they SWAT team the guy? Do they think he has a tachyon deflector in his pocket and that turns FBI agents into primordial soup?
They were hoping he had further evidence in his house, and didn't want him to destroy it.
I'm not saying it was right, I'm just saying that's why they did it.
Yep, this is exactly why we don't 'trust' the Powers That Be. Once they act like full grown adults for a while, maybe be can restart the discussion.
We should never trust the powers that be. There should always be oversight, because abuses are too easy.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."