US EditionAldrich Ames, Most Damaging CIA Traitor, Dies at 84
Aldrich Ames, convicted of betraying over 30 Western agents and receiving $2.5 million from Soviet and Russian intelligence, died while serving life in a Maryland prison.
- Monday, Aldrich Ames, former CIA counterintelligence officer, died at 84 while serving a life sentence at the Federal Correctional Institution in Cumberland, Maryland after compromising more than 100 intelligence operations.
- Pressure from personal finances and his marriage led Ames to approach the Soviets in 1985, giving them names of KGB officers for $50,000, with promises of more than $2 million for cooperation.
- Ames disclosed 10 agents and gave the KGB CIA assets lists that a 1994 Senate Intelligence Committee report said dealt a crippling blow; he met handlers in Vienna, Bogota, Caracas and served in Rome.
- Investigators arrested Ames on Feb. 21, 1994, in Arlington, Virginia, and nearly two months later he and Rosario Ames pleaded guilty to espionage charges, with Rosario sentenced to five years.
- Agency reviews later noted repeated missed warnings about Ames, including failed lie detector tests and unexplained wealth, while then-CIA Director R. James Woolsey condemned him as a betrayer.
269 Articles
269 Articles
Aldrich Hazen Ames is dead. The CIA mole, the protagonist of the biggest operational disaster in the history of U.S. intelligence agencies, died on January 5, 2026 in the federal prison of Cumberland, Maryland, United States. He was 84 years old and ended his days away from the luxuries he bought with the lives of his colleagues. His death closes a biographical chapter, but leaves open a story of betrayal of the nation that was cooked between th…
Conservative Review
The BlazeInfamous CIA officer turned Soviet spy dies in prison
After more than 30 years since pleading guilty to espionage that reportedly compromised several United States assets during the Cold War, an infamous Central Intelligence Agency officer has died in prison. Aldrich Ames died on Monday, according to the Bureau of Prisons website. Ames claimed he needed the money simply to pay debts and relieve 'financial troubles, immediate and continuing.'Ames was held in the Federal Correctional Institution in C…
Aldrich Ames, the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) agent who was sentenced to life imprisonment for selling secrets to Moscow, died on Monday in custody, reported U.S. authorities.
Aldrich Ames is considered one of the greatest traitors in the history of US intelligence. The CIA man spied for the Soviet Union as well as for Russia, earning millions – which he then disgusted, gladly also in cash.
Aldrich Ames, CIA agent who sold secrets to the Soviets, dies in prison
Aldrich Ames, the CIA agent who sold American secrets to the Soviets, has died at the age of 84. The former case officer died in custody on Monday, according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons inmate database. He had been serving out a life sentence without parole in a Maryland prison since 1994 after he…
Aldrich Ames, CIA agent and KGB molester, has betrayed the most intimate currency of espionage: he sold information to the Russian secret service. His betrayal shook the American secret service in its foundations.
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