Mr.
Schiff: Hi, welcome to "FBI 100, A Closer
Look." I'm Neal Schiff of the Bureau's Office
of Public Affairs along with FBI Historian Dr.
John Fox. John, espionage investigation at the
Department of Justice? Is that right?
Dr.
Fox: "Yes Neal, in late 1948 just before
the year ended, the Army brought us a big code-breaking
breakthrough. A message that told us that the
Soviets had been trying to recruit a young woman
in the Department of Justice in 1945. And when
we went to follow up on it, we learned that she
was still there and initiated an investigation
in early January to try and catch her."
Mr. Schiff: Well, what did FBI Special
Agents investigating find out?
Dr.
Fox: "Neal, they found out that Judith Coplon,
Department of Justice employee since 1943, had
been spying for the Soviet Union, that she had
access to FBI information and was collecting it
for her case officer, a guy named Valentine Gubitchev."
Mr.
Schiff: Well John, what happened?
Dr.
Fox: "Neal we set up a sting where we provided
her access to a document that we thought the Soviets
would be very interested in. We caught her with
the document in the company of her case officer.
She was brought to trial and convicted twice.
But both convictions were overturned on technicalities.
In the end, we could not convict her because the
source of our information about her initially
came from a code-breaking breakthrough that was
so secret it wasn't declassified until 1995.
Mr.
Schiff: From the FBI's Public Affairs office,
along with Bureau Historian Dr. John Fox, I'm
Neal Schiff with "FBI 100, A Closer Look."
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