Roth was convicted after a jury trial in U.S. District Court in Knoxville, of conspiracy, wire fraud, and 15 counts of exporting “defense articles and services” without a license. As a UT professor, Roth obtained an U.S. Air Force (USAF) contract to develop plasma actuators to control the flight of small, subsonic, unmanned, military drone aircraft. During the course of that contract, he allowed two foreign national students to access export controlled data and equipment, and export some of the data from the contract on a trip to China. The Arms Export Control Act prohibits the export of defense-related materials, including the technical data, to a foreign national or a foreign nation. This case was a first-of-its-kind prosecution of a university professor for the transfer of controlled defense technology to foreign national graduate students.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation led the investigation and was joined in its efforts by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, USAF Office of Special Investigations, and Department of Commerce Office of Export Enforcement. Assistant U.S. Attorneys Jeffrey Theodore and Will Mackie represented the United States.
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