Certainly there aren't any more in the agency. Well, that clears that up! Whew.
Jovana Deas was accused of illegally obtaining and disseminating classified government documents while working as a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) special agent in Nogales, Ariz., a city on the border with Mexico. She also was charged with obstruction and lying to investigators.
In February, she pled guilty to seven felonies and 14 misdemeanors in the case.
“I ask my family to forgive me. I’m sorry for what I did. It was a horrible mistake. I feel like I betrayed my country and my agency,” a sobbing Deas told a federal court in Tucson before U.S. District Judge Cindy K. Jorgenson handed down her sentence.
“I’m asking for your mercy your honor, so I can go back to my family.”
Prosecutors said Deas, who resigned from ICE last year, passed information pulled from restricted crime and immigration databases to her former brother-in-law, Miguel Angel Mendoza Estrada, a Mexican cartel associate with ties to drug traffickers in Brazil.
Some of the information – concerning the prior criminal history and immigration status of a convicted Mexican national – was later discovered on Mendoza Estrada’s laptop by Brazilian police, according to court documents.
U.S. Attorney James Lacey unsuccessfully pushed for a 10-year prison term, arguing that Deas’ crimes made her a “mini-Aldrich Ames” – a reference to the CIA agent who was convicted for spying for the Soviet Union and Russia in 1994.
Deas’ career with the federal government began in 2003 when she became a U.S. Customs and Border Protection inspector assigned to the Nogales port of entry. In 2008, she became an ICE special agent in the city.
Also named in the indictment was Deas’ sister, Dana Maria Samaniego, a former Mexican law enforcement official with alleged ties to drug trafficking organizations who remains a fugitive.
Read more: Chicago Tribune
Ex-U.S. agent who helped cartels gets 30 months in prison « Covert History
