Man accused of attempting to sell secrets

GREENFIELD, Ind. -- A man accused of offering to sell the names of U.S. intelligence agents to Iraq received espionage training in Russia about 30 years ago, a report said.\nCourt documents released Friday also said that Shaaban Hafiz Ahmad Ali Shaaban, a native of Jordan, had five passports and used several Social Security numbers.\nA federal grand jury on Thursday charged Shabaan, who allegedly used several aliases, with agreeing to act as a foreign agent for Iraq. He also faces immigration violations. Shabaan, 52, of Greenfield, was scheduled to appear for a detention hearing Wednesday before U.S. Magistrate Kennard Foster. If convicted, he could face deportation.\nIn 1972, he lived in Moscow and married his first wife, Svetlana Anatolevna Shaban, and it was unclear whether they were divorced, federal documents said.\nDuring his stay in Moscow, Shaaban received training from Russian intelligence agents, but federal documents did not outline what sort of training.\nAt the time, the Soviet Union was active in international spying, Edward B. Atkeson, a former chief of Army intelligence in Europe, told The Indianapolis Star in a story printed Saturday.\n"They did everything. You name it, they were up to it," Atkeson said.\nHe said Shaaban being allowed to enter Russia is a signal that he was likely recruited.\n"It was a police state -- nobody came in without their clear interest," said Atkeson, a senior fellow at the Virginia-based Institute of Land Warfare. "They would take a Jordanian with the idea of using him somehow."\nU.S. Attorney Susan Brooks was seeking to have Shaaban detained until his trial.\nShaaban's attorney, public defender William H. Dazey, talked with his client Friday at the Marion County Jail.\n"There are at least two sides to every story," Dazey said in a written statement. "The Constitution provides for a presumption of innocence for anyone accused of a crime."\nIn court documents, the U.S. Attorney's office called Shaaban "a serious threat to the nation's security."\nShabaan was born in Jordan but held passports from Jordan, Russia, Lebanon and the United States.\nSharon M. Jackson, the assistant U.S. attorney who is leading prosecutor in the case, said Shaaban was in the United States by at least May 1997. That month, he legally changed his name to Joe Brown in circuit court in Cook County, Ill., according to Brooks.\nHe and his wife moved to Indiana around 1999, and Shaaban became a naturalized U.S. citizen in November 2000. Shaaban has used at least 10 addresses and post office boxes in the past decade, records show. His neighbors in Greenfield, about 20 miles southeast of Indianapolis, said the mustached man was quiet and friendly.\nAccording to a federal indictment, Shaaban traveled at the Iraqi government's expense in late 2002 from Chicago to Baghdad, where he agreed to sell the names of U.S. intelligence agents to Saddam's government for $3 million, the indictment alleges. Brooks said the deal "was never consummated."\nShaaban had worked for Novelty Inc. until May 2004, driving a delivery truck for the Greenfield-based company that distribute toys, novelties and games.\nDuring his employment, Novelty marketed a deck of playing cards that listed the U.S. military's most-wanted Iraqi officials -- a game in which Saddam Hussein was the ace of spades.