(Washington) A former senior official of the American federal police, the FBI, was sentenced to four years and two months in prison for having worked for Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska, targeted by sanctions from Washington, the department announced Thursday of Justice.
Arrested in January, Charles McGonigal, 55, who headed the counterintelligence unit in the FBI’s New York office before retiring in 2018, pleaded guilty in August to attempting to violate the law sanctions and money laundering for the benefit of Oleg Deripaska.
He was sentenced Thursday to 50 months in prison and a $40,000 fine, the Justice Department said in a statement.
“Charles McGonigal betrayed the trust placed in him by his country by using his position at the FBI to prepare for his future in business,” said the attorney for the Southern District of New York, Damian Williams, quoted in the text, accusing him of having “compromised national security by offering his services to Oleg Deripaska, a Russian tycoon who behaves like an agent of Vladimir Putin”.
While participating in investigations into Russian oligarchs, including Oleg Deripaska (founder of aluminum giant Rusal), Charles McGonigal “began establishing a relationship with a Deripaska agent in hopes of doing business with this one once he retires from the FBI,” underlines the department.
“In 2021, he attempted to provide services to him, in violation of the sanctions imposed in 2018 by the United States against Deripaska,” prohibiting any commercial relationship between Americans and the latter, according to the press release.
He is particularly accused of having agreed to investigate a rival Russian oligarch on his behalf, in exchange for clandestine payments.
“McGonigal hoped to make millions of dollars from his dealings with Deripaska, but it was agents belonging to the FBI division he headed who foiled his scheme after only a few months,” assures the Department of Justice.