A former New York City Police Sergeant was sentenced to 1-1/2 years in prison on Wednesday for his 2023 sentence for acting as an illegal Chinese agent.
Michael McMahon was accused of being hired as a private investigator to examine a New Jersey resident who was accused by China of corruption, as part of a global campaign by the Chinese police to replace a happy liver abroad, known. “
A federal jury in Brooklyn found McMahon guilty of interstate harassment and acting as a Chinese agent without notifying the United States attorney general. The jury found him not guilty of conspiracy to act as a foreign agent. McMahon had declared himself innocent of all the positions.
McMahon was convicted in the midst of a broader impulse by the administration of Democratic President Joe Biden to take energetic measures against what he called transnational repression, or intimidation and harassment by US authoritarian adversaries such as China or Iran of Disidens on US soil.
However, the administration of Republican President Donald Trump has indicated that he will reduce the criminal application of the United States foreign influence laws.
Duration on her first day at work in February, the attorney general PAM Bondi said that prosecutors would bring criminal cases only when the conduct resembles “more traditional espionage”, focusing on the civil application in other scenarios.
McMahon has assured the support of two Republican representatives from the United States, Michael Lawler in New York and Pete Sessions of Texas. Last year, the two congressmen wrote a letter to the United States District Judge, Pamela Chen, urged him to avoid McMahon’s prison, citing his service as police for police and dedication to his family.
Two or Coacusados de McMahon, Yong Zhu and Congyping Zheng, were sentenced to two years and 1-1/3 years in prison, respectively.