FBI missed clues to spy's affair, report says
WASHINGTON -- Faced with evidence that an FBI informant was working for the country she was hired to spy on, bureau officials repeatedly turned to her supervisor, who brushed aside the concerns.
Bad idea, the FBI realized when it belatedly concluded that Katrina Leung, a Chinese-born California socialite and paid informant, and former agent James J. Smith had been lovers for nearly 20 years. The FBI paid Leung $1.7 million for her work.
The FBI missed many opportunities to uncover that Leung was working for China and getting her information from Smith, as well as to learn of the long affair between the pair, Justice Department inspector general Glenn A. Fine said yesterday.
In one instance in 2000, a tipster told the FBI that Leung was ``in bed with" the bureau's Los Angeles office, Fine said in a 23-page summary of an otherwise classified report. An FBI official at its Washington headquarters said it was unclear that the comment was meant literally.
Smith also was told about the tip, compromising any investigation, Fine said.
The FBI also failed to follow up on information that pointed directly to Smith even as the bureau was in the midst of a major espionage investigation that resulted in the arrest of Robert Hanssen, an FBI agent who spied for the Soviet Union and Russia over a 20-year period, Fine said.
Smith, who retired in 2000, was a veteran counterintelligence agent who had too much autonomy and also took advantage of frequently changing, inexperienced supervisors, Fine said.
Smith and Leung were arrested in 2003 and indicted on various charges, the most serious of which related to misuse of classified information.
Smith pleaded guilty to lesser charges in 2004. A federal judge dismissed the case against Leung, rebuking prosecutors for misconduct. 