ESPIONAGE IN U.S.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 87, Issue 202, 27 August 1943, Page 6

ESPIONAGE IN U.S.

THREE ARRESTS REPORTED Washington, Aug. 24. The arrest of Theresa Behrens, German-Hungarian secretary to the international centre of the Y.W.C.A.. Grace Buchanan Dineen and Dr. Fred William Thomas, on charges of esi pioage, is announced by the Justice ; Department. They are all of Detroit. ' They are charged with obtaining information. for Germany, including the location of war plants and their production capacity. They allegedly gathered information concerning military planes departing tor war theatres. The Justice Department said these were the first arrests under the wartime espionage statutes, which provide I "or a dealth penalty. I The Federal Bureau of Investigation director, Mr. J. Edgar Hoover, ‘said that the group’s activities since the United States entered the war centred about Grace Buchanan Dineen, described as an attractive, well educated descendant of French nobility, who, though a native of Canada, had been carefully trained by the Germans in espionage work. Mr. Hoover said she entered the United States on October 27, 1941, arriving in New York on an Atlantic Clipper. She first came to the attention of the Federal Bureau of Investigation as a mysterious “Miss Smith, of Detroit,” in November, 1941. Subsequently she co-operated fully with the F. 8.1., receiving information de-

sired by her German She operated under the surveillance of the F. 8.1., to which she passed on all information, which, though forwarded to her Nazi espionage superiors abroad, was cleared through the F. 8.1., Army and Navy Intelligence Services.

MORE ALIENS ARRESTED

Recd. 7 p.m. New York. Aug. 25. The Federal Bureau of Investigation director, Mr. J. Edgar Hoover, announced the arrest of two further women German aliens and a man in Detroit. They are Countess Mari- 1 anna von Moltke, Mrs. Emma Leonhardt and Bertrand Hoffman. Countess von Moltke is the wife of a professor of languages at Wayne University and is charged with trying to instill the college students with Naz» Socialism. Hoffman, aged 27. was recently assigned to a ship in New York after joining the United States merchant marine. Mr. Hoover said Hoffman furnished information regarding naval bases and convoys.