A former Pratt & Whitney Co. mechanical engineer will serve eight years and one month in federal prison for trying to sell trade secrets and other sensitive information to Iran, federal prosecutors say.
Mozaffar Khazaee, 61, formerly of Manchester, was sentenced Friday in Hartford federal court by U.S. District Judge Vanessa L. Bryant to 97 months in prison, plus three years of supervised release and ordered to pay a $50,000 fine, the Connecticut U.S. Attorney’s Office said.
Khazaee pleaded guilty last Feb. 25 pleaded guilty to one count of unlawful export and attempted export of defense articles from the U.S. in violation of the Arms Export Control Act. He had faced up to 20 years in prison and a $1 million fine.
“Mozaffar Khazaee betrayed his defense contractor employers and the national security interests of the United States by stealing and attempting to send to Iran voluminous documents containing highly sensitive U.S. defense technology,” Connecticut U.S. Attorney Deirdre M. Daly said in a statement announcing his conviction.
A dual citizen of both the U.S. and Iran, Khazaee began his covert efforts in 2009, attempting to sell trade secrets about America’s Joint Strike Fighter Program, for which Pratt is a primary engine builder, investigators said.
From at least 2009 through late 2013, Khazaee offered to provide trade secret, proprietary and export controlled defense technology that he had stolen from Pratt and two other defense employers to gain employment with state-controlled technical universities in Iran, prosecutors said.
On Jan. 9, 2014, Khazaee was arrested at a New Jersey airport, before boarding a flight to Iran. Investigators said search warrants on his checked and carry-on luggage revealed additional hard copy documents and computer media containing sensitive, proprietary, trade secret and export controlled documents relating to U.S. military jet engines.