Ex-State Department employee gets four-year prison sentence for selling secrets to China

"The defendant threw away his career, betrayed his country, and abused the trust the United States placed in him by granting his Top-Secret security clearance," Assistant Attorney General for National Security John A. Eisenberg said

By Natalia Mittelstadt

Published: September 5, 2025 9:49am

A State Department employee received a four-year prison sentence for selling secrets to China, according to the Justice Department.

Michael Charles Schena, 42, of Alexandria, Va., was sentenced on Thursday to 48 months in prison for conspiring to collect and transmit national defense information to people he believed to be working for the Chinese government.

Schena began communicating with people he met online through various platforms in April 2022, and provided them sensitive government information in exchange for money, according to court documents. Two of the people represented themselves as employees of international consulting companies. Schena continued his relationship with them despite clear indications and believing that they were working on behalf of the Chinese government.

Schena met with a person at a hotel in Peru in August 2024 who provided him with $10,000 and a cellphone that was for him to receive assignments and transmit information.

Schena used the cellphone while at work in October 2024, taking photographs and transmitting at least four SECRET level classified documents that contained national defense information. In February, Schena again used the cellphone to photograph seven documents marked as SECRET that contained national defense information, which was captured by surveillance video. Before Schena could transmit photographs of these classified documents to his handlers, FBI agents seized the cellphone and arrested him.

“The defendant threw away his career, betrayed his country, and abused the trust the United States placed in him by granting his Top-Secret security clearance. He will spend years of his life in prison for passing classified information to individuals he believed to be Chinese government agents,” Assistant Attorney General for National Security John A. Eisenberg said. “Today’s sentence serves as a warning to those who would violate the trust placed in them by our Nation and double-cross the American people.”