Couple found guilty of spying for Vietnam

Press, 22 May 1978, Page 9

Couple found guilty of spying for Vietnam

NZPA Alexandria (Virginia) An American Federal jury has convicted a former Government official and a Viet-, namese student of spying for Hanoi in the first es-| pionage case tracing to thej Vietname war. Some of the jurors wept in announcing' the verdict. Rejecting arguments the defendants did not mean to harm the United States, the six-man, six-woman jury [ found a former United! States Information Agency! employee, Ronald Humphrey, aged 42, and an anti-war ex- ‘ patriate Vietnamese, David t

(Truong, aged 32, guilty of: six of the seven espionage |and conspiracy counts! against them. Defence lawyers had por-[ trayed the two as innocents [ jabroad, dealing only with! i information already known! [ in an attempt to improve relations between the United! States and Vietnam. Humphrey’s lawyers told the court he had been trying Ito ease the passage of his I. [ common-law wife — he met | her while working in South: I Vietnam as a United States! I information officer — and I children to the United' ' States.

| The verdict represented a crushing rejection of the defence claims in that it reI turned a guilty finding on Severy possible count — the [one innocent finding being | inevitable because the (charge conflicted with an-i other on which a guilty ver- 1 [diet was returned. The emotional impact was I immediate in the court ( room. Relatives of the two men ( burst into tears and so did i some of the jurors, who! were observed weeping in, the jury box and heard sob-i bing audibly as they left the! court.