CIA spy Aldrich Ames, jailed for selling secrets to Moscow and endangering agents, dies at 84 in US custody
WASHINGTON: Aldrich Ames, the Central Intelligence Agency spy who was sentenced to life in prison for selling secrets to Moscow, costing the lives of a dozen double agents, died Monday in custody, US authorities said.
He was 84, according to the Bureau of Prisons.
Ames worked as a counterintelligence analyst for the CIA for 31 years and, along with his wife Rosario, was convicted of selling information to the Soviet Union between 1985 and 1993 — compromising secret missions and costing lives — in exchange for more than $2.5 million.
Ames had been head of the Soviet branch in the CIA’s counterintelligence group.
The couple’s luxurious lifestyle at the time — they kept cash in Swiss bank accounts, drove a Jaguar and ran up $50,000 annually in credit card bills — drew suspicion.
Federal prosecutors said Ames spied for the Soviet Union and after its collapse, kept selling Russia information, until he was exposed in 1994.