An Iranian-American man was sentenced on Tuesday to one year in prison for secretly working with Iranian intelligence to obtain sensitive information on the US aviation and energy sectors.
Abouzar Rahmati, 43, a naturalized US citizen and resident of Great Falls, Virginia, received a 12-month sentence in US District Court in Washington after pleading guilty in April to acting as an unregistered agent of the Iranian government and to conspiracy.
Judge Loren L. AliKhan also ordered three years of supervised release.
“By secretly doing the bidding of the Iranian government, Mr. Rahmati violated the trust placed in him as a US citizen and as a federal contractor with access to sensitive information,” US Attorney Jeanine Ferris Pirro said in announcing the sentence.
“Ensuring that sensitive US information does not fall into the hands of hostile foreign intelligence services remains one of our highest priorities.”
Rahmati began cooperating with Iranian officials in 2017 after offering his services to a former Ministry of Intelligence contact, according to prosecutors.
He traveled to Iran later that year, meeting intelligence officers and agreeing to gather information under the guise of academic research.
On his return, Rahmati collected both public and restricted materials on the US solar energy industry and provided them to Iranian officials. He later took a job with a Federal Aviation Administration contractor, where prosecutors said he accessed sensitive non-public data on aviation systems.
In 2022, Rahmati traveled to Iran with more than 170 gigabytes of FAA contractor files stored on removable media. Iranian intelligence officers told him they sought advanced technology unavailable in Iran and promised financial rewards for useful material, according to court records.
“Rahmati exploited his trusted position to obtain sensitive information about the US aviation sector and share it with the Iranian government,” FBI Special Agent in Charge Daniel Wierzbicki said.
“Today’s sentencing demonstrates the FBI’s commitment to disrupt threats to US critical infrastructure.”
The FBI and FAA's counterintelligence division were involved in the investigation. Rahmati will begin serving his sentence immediately.
