"... According to charging documents, since 2008, [Dr. Charles Lieber, 61] has served as the Principal Investigator of the Lieber Research Group at Harvard University, specializing in the area of nanoscience. Lieber’s research at the Lieber Research Group has been funded by more than $15 million in research grants from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and Department of Defense (DOD). Among other things, these grants required the disclosure of all sources of research support, potential financial conflicts of interest and all foreign collaboration. It is alleged that, unbeknownst to Harvard University, beginning in 2011, Lieber became a 'Strategic Scientist' at Wuhan University of Technology (WUT) in China. He later became contractual participant in China’s Thousand Talents Plan from at least 2012 through 2015. China’s Thousand Talents Plan is one of the most prominent Chinese talent recruitment plans designed to attract, recruit, and cultivate high-level scientific talent in furtherance of China’s scientific development, economic prosperity and national security. According to court documents, these talent recruitment plans seek to lure Chinese overseas talent and foreign experts to bring their knowledge and experience to China, and they often reward individuals for stealing proprietary information. Under the terms of Lieber’s three-year Thousand Talents contract, WUT allegedly paid Lieber a salary of up to $50,000 USD per month, living expenses of up to 1 million Chinese Yuan (approximately $158,000 USD at the time) and awarded him more than $1.5 million to establish a research lab at WUT.... On or about April 24, 2018, during an interview with federal investigators, it is alleged that Lieber falsely stated that he was never asked to participate in the Thousand Talents Program...."
The Department of Justice says.
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Chinese Spying Made Easy. Just by up the University Department heads.
The crime is lying, not doing. They're after scaring people in the press release, which might not be a good idea - foreign collaboration is generally desireable.
Let the sunlight shine in on all these traitorous assholes in the academy, the media, business, and government.
I'm going to love all of the schadenfreude this indictment produces. Comedy gold.
What are the other 999 talents?
Scum! Or is traitor a better word?
Selling out your country to China for $$$$$.
Yeah Harvard!
Did NONE of his colleagues notice he was living above his means?
$50,000/month?
Harvard hires nothing but the best and the brightest who are too stupid to notice and question a relationship of such magnitude with the Chinese?
And no questions were asked by no one!
China probably taught him how to be a good liar, too!
Democrat. Harvard professor. Chinese stooge. Nice.
Harvard is knee deep in COVID-19 scandals.
Maybe somebody wants to sing in exchange for leniency.
rhhardin said...foreign collaboration is generally desireable.
Stealing technology for an enemy nation is generally not.
How can a Harvard professor be so stupid as to think an exchange of that much money would be untraceable by federal investigators? My guess is that there's tax fraud involved in all this, too.
I wonder if he knows the Chinese spy who worked for Diane Feinstein's office for 20 years???
He was leaning forward.
How many others?
No tape? No lie. Sorry FBI.
There have been several seperate events involving Chinese nationals stealing Seed corn technology from Pioneer (was owned by dupont, now Dow) and Dekalb (Monsanto). Between Monsanto and Dow, the two corp. control ~80% of the genetics and 95% of the bio engineered traits.
DES MOINES, Iowa – A naturalized U.S. citizen from China has entered a plea agreement with federal prosecutors, admitting he participated in a conspiracy to steal seed corn from U.S. companies.
Mo Hailong, who was living in Florida when he was arrested in December 2013, is accused of traveling to the Midwest with other employees of a seed corn subsidiary of Beijing-based DBN Group to take seed out of Iowa fields with the intent of reproducing its genetic traits.
The fields where the Chinese men were caught crawing around (at night) were parent seed production fields. The genetic lines used to cross pollinate to create the lines used to produce seed corn.
The plea agreement says Mo admits he conspired to steal trade secrets from DuPont Pioneer and Monsanto.
Mo will be sentenced later in Des Moines. Prosecutors have agreed not to seek a prison sentence exceeding five years.
The investigation began two years ago when Pioneer security staff discovered Chinese men crawling around in cornfields.
Most Talents are Chinese nationals.
It's not cooperation. Talents set up shadow labs in China. They build their research on research results from the West to leapfrog the West. They keep their results under wraps and obtain patents. These Talents stole western scientists' efforts, hopes, and their future.
Research proposals can be rejected here by their Talents in high places, e.g. in the NIH. The proposals were sent to China and Chinese scientists would get the credits.
A Talent stole 20 vials of SARS virus from the Canadian P4 Lab and carried out their research in the Wuhan Labs. Those viruses may well be the ancestors of COVID-19.
Charles Lieber, America born and bred, is the worst vermin.
Let's assume lying and tax fraud. Why? Cuz that level of "collaboration" would likely slow or stop U.S. funding.
But of course all of American science has become heavily dependent on Asian talent and deeply involved in exchange of knowledge anyway, with real benefits to the U.S. as well as China.
Should there be a partial divorce? Can there be? Are these arrests "helping"?
Well, consider the alternative per Milton: "And that one talent which 'tis death to hide."
Will a FARA crackdown rock DC and Big Tech next?
I hope the good professor dies in prison, if he has been selling out his own country.
If this is another FBI written 302 nonsense claims of a lie, then they don't want me on a jury- I will acquit since I give FBI agents zero points for honesty. There had better be a video of the interview.
I am guessing there is tax fraud involved here- as a US citizen, you have to declare income from all sources and pay taxes on it. I am guessing Lieber might not have done this, and this is just the first indictment. If he did pay all the taxes, then this indictment is a sham.
Many university chemistry departments and companies have been targeted by Chinese theft of intellectual property over the years. A small company that I worked for in the 90's hired a Chinese national. He wasn't stellar "talent -- just willing to work as a temp w/o healthcare. He ended up appropriating trade secrets and everything that wasn't covered by patents.
There is one prominent commenter here who doesn't "believe" in intellectual property, based on some crackpot radio personality. He can get screwed.
rhhardin said...
The crime is lying, not doing.
No, the crime is signing up for a Chinese program that pays people to steal information and give it to the Chinese government.
Lying is piling crime on top of crime.
Anyone who values America over Communist China understands the US Gov't must aggressively work to destroy the "Thousand Talents" program, and every other program the Chinese Communist Government uses to connect to or influence people in the US.
A good start would be "no student loans for anyone at any school / college / university that accepts any money from the Communist Chinese government, in any form.
Have an instructor on your staff who's part of the TT program? No loans for your students. Have a "Confucius Institute"? Same. Do any joint research with people from mainland China? Same.
China is our enemy. We need to start treating them that way.
We need to also start treating their US collaborators that way
The arrest of this Harvard professor was announced quite a while ago. The fact that he has now been formally charged means that the plea negotiations broke down, and so the US Atty is moving forward. They went with a false statements charge because it is the easiest to prove (hard to see what the defense would be, but I assume the defendant or his defense counsel had a reason to decline whatever plea was offered other than wishing it would go away). The gov't has the right to add charges later on if they want to (superceding indictments are common in federal criminal practice), and this case sounds like the gov't could add wire/mail fraud charges (among others) if they wanted to -- a material false statement in an application for the NIH or DoD grants referred to by DoJ would certainly provide the factual predicate for such charges.
This dance isn't over, and like most federal criminal cases, may well result in a plea because the usual factors pushing the defendant to plead are all here: defending a federal criminal charge is expensive and exhausting (your life is on hold, and it tends to occupy your entire attention), and (unlike the Flynn case, e.g.) the evidence is straightforward and seemingly strong.
The motivation for his behavior is still a question. He was the head of a department and held an endowed professorship at Harvard, which is about as good as it gets in American academe. He was said to drive a beat-up old car, which doesn't suggest much interest in material wealth.
Why would he trade what he had for any amount of money? He didn't need money. Such behavior would only tarnish his record.
It's tempting to think there was some extortion applied, but even if that were the case, he could have gone to the feds, come clean and absolved himself pre-emptively of a charge of treason.
There has to be something else going on here.
I'm not sure about this one. But there was a case in Arkansas recently where the professor failed to disclose that he was getting money from the Chinese government while working on US federal contracts:
https://www.stripes.com/news/us/fbi-arrests-arkansas-professor-on-fraud-charges-over-financial-ties-to-china-1.629360
I suspect it will be the same with Lieber. I too am dubious of an FBI 302 and a charge for lying, but failing to disclose foreign funding sources while working in certain research fields is a big no no. Submitting a grant application without mentioning that the Chinese government is funding your research is fraud.
Very troubling issue. I've long been dubious about the degree to which Chinese nationals have been given access to sensitive systems and research. I was around when Nixon went to China and believed that improving trade and diplomatic relations was a positive development. On balance, it has been. I've seen this statement at Instapundit: "We're not exporting our values, we're importing theirs.". It's extremely important to vet these relationships; the CCP doesn't play for shits and giggles.
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