Aldrich Ames, CIA Officer Turned Double Agent, Dies in Prison at 84

Aldrich Ames, the former CIA counterintelligence officer whose spying for the Soviet Union and Russia caused some of the worst intelligence breaches in US history, has died aged 84. He passed away on Monday at the Federal Correctional Institution in Cumberland, Maryland.

Career of espionage

Ames was sentenced to life without parole on April 28, 1994 after admitting he sold classified information to the KGB, compromising over 100 operations and revealing the identities of more than 30 Western agents. At least 10 of those spies were later killed.

He began providing informattion to the other side in April 1985, motivated by debts, accepting $50,000 in exchange for the first set of names. Known to the KGB as Kolokol (The Bell), Ames received around $2.5 mln over nine years, funding a lavish lifestyle including a Jaguar, overseas travel, and a $540,000 home.

Personal life and motivations

Aldrich Ames began his CIA career in 1962 with help from his father, a CIA analyst, and later married fellow agent Nancy Segebarth. After an assignment in Turkey and a return to the US, his personal life became troubled, including alcohol issues and marital problems.

While posted in Mexico City in 1981, he met his second wife, Maria del Rosario Casas Dupuy, a Colombian embassy attaché and CIA asset who later became his accomplice. Ames’s growing debts drove him to sell secrets rather than ideological motives.

FBI agent Leslie G Wiser, who investigated Ames, later said: «It was about the money, and I don’t think he ever really tried to lead anybody to believe it was anything more than that.»

Capture and legacy

Ames was arrested on February 21, 1994 following a mole hunt. He cooperated with authorities in exchange for a lighter sentence for his wife, who was released after five years.

CIA director at the time, R. James Woolsey, described Ames as «a malignant betrayer of his country», adding: «The agents he betrayed died because a murdering traitor wanted a bigger house and a Jaguar.»