China Doll
Katrina Leung was a temptress, beguiled by the world of intrigue, but was she an agent of influence for Beijing, as prosecutors now charge?
Counting the cost. On balance, some espionage experts say, Leung probably didn't cause as much damage as Ames, Hanssen, or Larry Wu-Tai Chin, a former CIA translator who spied on the United States for nearly four decades before being convicted and taking his own life (box, Page 40). Unlike Ames, Hanssen, and Chin, there is no evidence at all that Leung's actions jeopardized the lives of American espionage assets working against China. But Wortzel and other experts say the damage could be colossal, principally because of the extraordinary access J .J. Smith and Bill Cleveland had to some of the nation's most precious intelligence secrets. As supervisory special agents, Smith and Cleveland were privy to the entire gamut of FBI China operations and led major China investigations. All must now be re-examined. Among the most critical issues: Did Leung play any role in the botched espionage investigation of Los Alamos nuclear scientist Wen Ho Lee or in its largely inconclusive investigation of Chinese government campaign contributions to the Clinton-Gore re-election campaign in 1996? "We may never know what we lost," says Wortzel. "What we will never know is if what we got was fed to us and created in China to mislead us, or was real. . . . The question is, Who was controlling whom?"
If Leung had her way, the FBI contends, no one would ever know the answer to that question. In December of last year, four months before her arrest, Leung sat for an interview with the FBI. Afterward, Special Agent Peter Duerst walked her outside, with a hidden tape recorder running. "You know," Leung, said, according to court papers, "I think the perfect way to end all this, if I just . . . disappear, not disappear, oh well, wouldn't that be nice? I mean if I don't exist, if I do not exist anymore? Would it help?"
Leung's attorneys contend that the FBI distorted Leung's remarks. Leung also told Duerst, during the official interview, that going to court was her only salvation: "Here I know at least I would have a so-called fair trial if we go on trial. And if you lock me up, at least you won't say, `OK, I'm gonna have somebody murder you in prison.' OK?" Later, in the chat with Special Agent Duerst and several of his coinvestigators, Leung sought to reassure the agents: "And I'm not going anywhere, OK? I'm not going anywhere, period. I'll be right here."
With Carol Hook
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