NASA Langley employees federally charged for allowing unrestricted access to laptop

Federal Marshal's transport Bo Jiang to the Newport News Federal Court this morning. A detention and preliminary hearing are scheduled Thursday for a former NASA Langley Research Center contractor who was arrested on a plane bound for China.

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HAMPTON — Two NASA Langley Research Center employees were federally charged on Tuesday for failing to restrict access to a laptop computer by a foreign national who took it out of the country.

Employees Glenn A. Woodell and Daniel J. Jobson allowed full and unrestricted access to a NASA laptop between 2011 and 2013, which was in violation of NASA's procedural requirement, according to court documents.

Aside from confirming that charges were filed against the employees, a spokeswoman for the U.S attorney's office in Norfolk declined to comment about the case.

Typically the next step when someone is charged is for a grand jury to decide whether to indict.

The two men — who were the "sponsors" of a Chinese contractor while he was in the country — "unlawfully and willfully violated a regulation and order promulgated by the Administrator of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration for the protection and security of any laboratory, station, base or other facility…" according to court documents.The foreign national is not named in the court documents, but the time frame referenced is the same as when Bo Jiang was a contractor for NASA Langley.

Jiang, a Chinese national, pleaded guilty in 2013 to misdemeanor charge of downloading pornography, movies and TV shows to his NASA laptop computer that he used in his job at the National Institute of Aerospace. He was initially accused of lying to federal agents about the computers and storage devices he was carrying when agents boarded the plane he was on at Dulles International Airport.

"Jiang used a NASA laptop computer furnished to a contractor to download, view and store copyrighted movies and television shows, and materials depicting sexually explicit and sexually oriented materials," violating NASA policy directives, according to a criminal charge filed in 2013.

As part of a plea agreement, a pending felony charge of lying to federal agents was dismissed, and Jiang had to return to China within 48 hours of the 2013 hearing.

NASA Langley was forwarding all press inquiries about the case to its D.C. headquarters, where no one returned a phone call for comment on Wednesday.

Jiang's case caused a national debate about the access and theft of data from government agencies, notably to countries such as China.

A whistle-blower at NASA Langley informed Rep. Frank Wolf, R-McLean, who has since retired, about the issue and he pressed the FBI to investigate.

"I appreciate the attorney general's office and the FBI for staying with this case … I tended to think that initially the government may let it drop," Wolf said. "I'm very thankful for the whistleblower who had the courage to come forward."

Jiang came to the United States in 2007 and earned a doctorate degree from Old Dominion University in 2010. Jiang worked at the National Institute of Aerospace (NIA) and did not have access to classified or export controlled information, and never sought such access, according to a state of facts included in Jiang's case.

The NIA is an NASA contractor.

In 2012, NASA investigators learned that Jiang had taken a NASA laptop home to China in November 2012 -- in violation of a NASA regulation that bars taking the computer to that country. Upon his return to the United States in December 2012, Jiang was asked to return the computer equipment to the National Institute of Aerospace, and he was barred from entering the NASA Langley grounds. His job was terminated Jan. 11, 2013.

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