Steven John Lalas - Greece's hidden ace in FYROM name negotiations

Former Greek spy returns after 14 years in US prison
Athens - A former Greek spy on Sunday returned to Athens after spending 14 years in prison in the United States, ending a spectacular espionage affair between the two countries.

The case had put a heavy strain on diplomatic relations in the 1990s.

Fifty-four-year old Steven Lalas, a US citizen of Greek origin, worked as a member of the technical staff at US consulates in Izmir, Turkey, Belgrade in the former

Yugoslavia and Athens, from where he forwarded secret documents to the Greek intelligence service.

The documents were mainly concerned with US policy during the first phase of the Balkan crisis.

Lalas was busted in 1992 and sentenced to 14 years in prison on charges of espionage in the US in 1993.

His activities were discovered when he was working at the US embassy in Athens.

High-ranking Greek diplomats are said to have boasted of being well-informed of US plans in the Balkans, leading US espionage experts to carry out checks.

Lalas was caught red-handed on hidden cameras, the media in Athens reported on Sunday.

He was subsequently arrested and sentenced after a trip to the US.

Following his release from a high-security US prison, Lalas will have to inform authorities on his movements for the next five years.

The return of the former spy was facilitated by an agreement between the governments in Washington and Athens.

Lalas also committed himself never again to return to the US, Greek media reported.

Steven John Lalas
Steven (Stavros) John Lalas is a Greek American and a former State Department communications officer. Charged with passing sensitive military and diplomatic information to Greek officials, he was arrested in northern Virginia on May 3, 1993.

Spying activities

During his active years as a spy, he passed an estimated 700 highly classified documents, that included U.S. gathered intelligence information of Turkish military strategy in the Aegean Sea and Cyprus, and U.S. diplomatic assessments and views on Former Yugoslav Republic Of Macedonia. Athens was Lalas' fourth communications posting with the State Department. He also served at posts in İzmir(where he was allegedly recruited by the Greeks), Belgrade, Istanbul, and Taiwan. US investigators claimed he made an average of US$24,000 over a two-year period by providing documents, thus earning a steady income selling Defense Intelligence Agency reports about troop strength, political analyses, and military discussions contained in cables between the U.S. Embassy in Athens and the White House. He also obtained information from FBI communications about counter-terrorism efforts, and the names and job descriptions of CIA personnel stationed overseas.

Lalas' apprehension

According to the U.S. Government, it received the first tip that led to identification of Lalas as a spy as a result of an accidental slip in a conversation between an official of the Greek Embassy in Washington and a State Department official. The Greek official knew of information that could only have come from a secret communication between the U.S. Embassy in Athens and the State Department. The State Department official recognized something wasn't right and reported it. This led to an FBI secret investigation, and Lalas was later observed through a video monitoring system stealing documents intended for destruction, taking them out of the US embassy and handing them over to his Greek liaison.

Also according to U.S. authorities, Lalas originally claimed he had been recruited by Greek military officials in 1991, and that he feared for the welfare of relatives living in Greece if he had not cooperated. Authorities later discovered that he began spying for the Greek government in 1977 while with the U.S. Army.

The Sombolay and Lalas Cases
These two cases underscore the miscarriage of justice and the unequal treatment that occurred in the Pollard Case.

In the one case, you have an American soldier, Albert Sombolay, who in spite of having spied for Iraq during the Gulf War - a clear act of treason - received what can only be described as a "slap on the wrist" as a punishment. Sombolay's actions could have resulted in the death of hundreds of thousands of U.S. troops fighting against Iraq. Yet in his case, the Army and U.S. government bent over backwards to downplay the case and to hush it up. Sombolay's 35 year sentence was quietly reduced to 19 years. Further reductions likely occurred as a result of appeals that were planned in the wake of this first reduction. The case then became so shrouded from public view that it has not been possible to get any further information on it since then.

In the other case you have a State Department official, Steven Lalas who, out of ethnic loyalty to Greece, exposed the identities of countless CIA agents operating in the Balkans. He put the lives of all of these American agents in jeopardy. Lalas did not even honor the terms of his plea agreement, and yet in spite of this, and in spite of the enormity of his crimes, the government still honored its plea agreement with him. The CIA restrained itself so completely in this case that it declined to even comment about the potential harm Lalas' actions may have caused to the national security. Throughout the Lalas case, Greece was treated with kid gloves. Compare and contrast this to the savaging that Israel took from the U.S. government and media in the wake of the arrest of Jonathan Pollard.

The treatment of Sombolay and Lalas cases by the U.S. government was delicate and restrained. Consequently, the American public is largely unaware of these two, in spite of the enormously serious crimes that they committed against the United States. The Pollard case, on the other hand has been so sensationalized that it is unlikely that either Pollard or Israel will ever fully recover from the effects of the smear campaign that the government has waged against them in the media since the inception of this case.

Lalas: Something Wasn't Right
Steven J. Lalas, an American of Greek descent, was a State Department communications officer stationed with the U.S. Embassy in Athens, Greece. He also served at posts in Belgrade, Istanbul, and Taiwan. Charged with passing sensitive military information to Greek officials, he was arrested in Northern Virginia on May 3, 1993.
The U.S. Government received the first tip that led to identification of Lalas as a spy as a result of an accidental slip in a conversation between an official of the Greek Embassy in Washington and a State Department official. The Greek official knew of information that could  only have come from a secret communication between the U.S. Embassy in Athens and the State Department. The State Department official recognized something wasn't right and reported it. This led to an investigation, and Lalas was later observed through a video monitoring system stealing documents intended for destruction.

Lalas originally claimed he had been recruited by Greek military officials in 1991, and that he feared for the welfare of relatives then living in Greece if he had not cooperated. Authorities later discovered that he began spying for the Greek government in 1977 while with the U.S. Army.

He passed an estimated 700 highly classified documents, including papers dealing with plans and readiness for U.S. military strategy in the Balkans and a U. S. assessment of Greece's intentions toward the former Yugoslavia. Athens was Lalas' fourth communications posting with the State Department. During his espionage career he earned a steady income stealing, then selling, DIA reports about troop strength, political analyses, and military discussions contained in cables between the U.S. Embassy in Athens and the White House. He also obtained information from FBI communications about counter-terrorism efforts, and the names and job descriptions of CIA personnel stationed overseas.

Greek handlers allegedly paid him $20,000 for about 240 documents over a three-year period ending with his arrest.

In June 1993, Lalas pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit espionage and on September 16 was sentenced to 14 years in federal prison without possibility of parole. Prosecutors had recommended the 14-year sentence in return for Lalas' promise to reveal what documents he turned over and to whom.

The full extent of his espionage activity was confirmed prior to his sentencing only after he failed two FBI polygraph examinations. Lalas [was at the time] serving his sentence in federal prison.

Reference
"Profile of a Spy," in Security Matters, the FBI Security Education Bulletin. Summer 1996.