Penetrating the CIA and FBI

The US certainly appears incapable of penetrating various terrorist groups around the world, but it would appear that a Hizbullah sympathizer didn't have any problem having someone penetrate both the CIA and FBI.

Chutzpah.

The NYT reports:

A Lebanese-born C.I.A. officer who had previously worked as an F.B.I. agent pleaded guilty on Tuesday to charges that she illegally sought classified information from government computers about the radical Islamic group Hezbollah.

The plea agreement by the defendant, Nada Nadim Prouty, appeared to expose grave flaws in the methods used by the Central Intelligence Agency and the Federal Bureau of Investigation to conduct background checks on its investigators.

Ms. Prouty, 37, who also confessed that she had fraudulently obtained American citizenship, faces up to 16 years in prison.

Court papers do not specifically say why Ms. Prouty sought information about Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed militant group that is based in southern Lebanon, from the F.B.I.’s computer case files in June 2003, the month she left the bureau to join the C.I.A.

There is no accusation in the documents that she passed information on to Hezbollah or any other extremist group.

Just because the accusation was not included in the deal doesn't mean that she didn't engage in such behavior. It is possible that the investigators simply didn't have evidence that could be proffered in court that would show her to have passed such information on.

Note also that she was an illegal alien who managed to obtain the relevant documentation to appear as a legal citizen.

The DOJ press release offers the following:

At a hearing in Detroit before the U.S. District Court Judge Avern Cohn, Prouty entered a plea of guilty to counts one, two and three of a second superseding information. Count one of the information charges conspiracy, for which the maximum penalty is five years imprisonment and a $250,000 fine. Count two charges unauthorized computer access, for which the maximum penalty is one year imprisonment and a $100,000 fine. Count three charges naturalization fraud, for which the maximum penalty is 10 years imprisonment and a $250,000 fine, and requires the court to de-naturalize the defendant.

“This case highlights the importance of conducting stringent and thorough background investigations,” said U.S. Attorney Stephen J. Murphy. “It’s hard to imagine a greater threat than the situation where a foreign national uses fraud to attain citizenship and then, based on that fraud insinuates herself into a sensitive position in the U.S. government. I applaud the excellent investigative work of the FBI, ICE and DHS, which led to the successful prosecution today.”

And you wonder why Gov. Spitzer had his prized illegal alien drivers license scheme killed and/or put down?

Prouty isn't the only one being sought either. One of Prouty's former employers, Talal Khalil Chahine, is currently a fugitive believed to be in Lebanon. He, along with Prouty’s sister, Elfat El Aouar, and others were charged in 2006 in the Eastern District of Michigan with tax evasion in connection with a scheme to conceal more than $20 million in cash received by La Shish restaurants and to route funds to persons in Lebanon. Chahine has also been charged, along with a senior ICE official in Detroit, in a bribery and extortion conspiracy in which federal immigration benefits were allegedly awarded to illegal aliens in exchange for money.

Prouty's status should have been discovered not once, but twice. The first time was when she was hired at the FBI and the second when hired at the CIA. Both background checks failed to catch the significant problem - she wasn't a valid US citizen.

UPDATE:
According to the NY Post, Prouty faces the following criminal sanctions:

Under the most serious charge she pleaded to, naturalization fraud, she could have faced 10 years in jail. The agreement calls for her to serve six to 12 months and be stripped of her citizenship.

I'd call that a slap on the wrist, considering who she worked with and for - especially Chahine.

UPDATE:
Wizbang notes that Prouty also managed to become a CPA in Virginia after the FBI discovered her shenanigans.

One interesting note is that seven months after the FBI discovered her espionage Prouty was able to sit for and pass the Virginia CPA exam and she's now a fully licensed CPA by the Commonwealth of Virginia. One would imagine that being a fraud and a spy might be enough to have your CPA license revoked, wouldn't you?

UPDATE:
Just how big a role did Prouty have? According to Andrea Mitchell and NBC News, she was assigned to debriefing high ranking al Qaeda suspects.

Current and former intelligence officials tell NBC News that Nada Nadim Prouty had a much bigger role than officials at the FBI and CIA first acknowledged. In fact, Prouty was assigned to the CIA’s most sensitive post, Baghdad, and participated in the debriefings of high-ranking al- Qaida detainees.

A former colleague called Prouty “among the best and the brightest” CIA officers in Baghdad. She was so exceptional, agree officials of both agencies, the CIA recruited her from the FBI to work for the agency’s clandestine service at Langley, Va., in June 2003. She then went to Iraq for the agency to work with the U.S. military on the debriefings.

Best and brightest was often a phrase used in reference to Robert Hanssen, who is now serving life in prison for espionage.