MastanKhan
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Woman Accused of Dealing Military Aircraft Controls to China
Maryland woman arrested on charges of sending miniature controls for small unmanned military reconnaissance aircraft to China.
WASHINGTON -- A Maryland woman was charged Friday with exporting miniature controls for small unmanned aircraft to China.
The government says the controls are the world's smallest and involve a technology that cannot be shared with China because of national security concerns. The devices can be used to fly small military reconnaissance planes.
Yaming Nina Qi Hanson of Silver Spring, Md., is accused of taking the controls to China last August without a required export license. If convicted, she faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison and a $1 million fine.
Qi Hanson and her husband, Harold Hanson, arranged over e-mail to buy the controls from a Canadian company, MicroPilot of Manitoba, according to the criminal complaint. Company officials told the couple they could ship the controls to the United States but the couple would have to get an export permit to send the controls to another country.
Harold Hanson claimed the controls were going to be used by a model airplane club in Xi'an, China. But Canadian officials objected, questioning why automated controls would be used for model airplanes that are typically flown manually. Hanson replied that "typical of Asian men, these modelers want the very best product on the market."
MicroPilot eventually agreed to sell Hanson 20 controls at the cost of just over $90,000 including shipping via UPS, after he sent a letter stating that he would not export them out of the United States without the required permit, according to the complaint. Although Hanson filed a claim with UPS saying his shipment had been lost, the criminal complaint stated the couple admitted in interviews that Qi Hanson hand-delivered them to a former classmate in China even though they knew it was illegal.
Qi Hanson told agents she works for Italian airline seat manufacturer Geven and had relationships with Chinese government and airline industry officials from her time studying at the Chinese University of Civil Aviation.
A spokesman for the U.S. attorney's office said Hanson, who works at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in the patient safety office, had not yet been charged in the case.
Maryland woman arrested on charges of sending miniature controls for small unmanned military reconnaissance aircraft to China.
WASHINGTON -- A Maryland woman was charged Friday with exporting miniature controls for small unmanned aircraft to China.
The government says the controls are the world's smallest and involve a technology that cannot be shared with China because of national security concerns. The devices can be used to fly small military reconnaissance planes.
Yaming Nina Qi Hanson of Silver Spring, Md., is accused of taking the controls to China last August without a required export license. If convicted, she faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison and a $1 million fine.
Qi Hanson and her husband, Harold Hanson, arranged over e-mail to buy the controls from a Canadian company, MicroPilot of Manitoba, according to the criminal complaint. Company officials told the couple they could ship the controls to the United States but the couple would have to get an export permit to send the controls to another country.
Harold Hanson claimed the controls were going to be used by a model airplane club in Xi'an, China. But Canadian officials objected, questioning why automated controls would be used for model airplanes that are typically flown manually. Hanson replied that "typical of Asian men, these modelers want the very best product on the market."
MicroPilot eventually agreed to sell Hanson 20 controls at the cost of just over $90,000 including shipping via UPS, after he sent a letter stating that he would not export them out of the United States without the required permit, according to the complaint. Although Hanson filed a claim with UPS saying his shipment had been lost, the criminal complaint stated the couple admitted in interviews that Qi Hanson hand-delivered them to a former classmate in China even though they knew it was illegal.
Qi Hanson told agents she works for Italian airline seat manufacturer Geven and had relationships with Chinese government and airline industry officials from her time studying at the Chinese University of Civil Aviation.
A spokesman for the U.S. attorney's office said Hanson, who works at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in the patient safety office, had not yet been charged in the case.
