Harold James Nicholson Harold James Nicholson ( born 1950 ) is a former Central Intelligence Agency officer and a twice - convicted spy for Russia ' s Foreign Intelligence Service ( SVR ) . His recruitment to the SVR appears to have occurred in the wake of a much publicized arrest of senior CIA officer and Moscow mole Aldrich Ames in February 1994 , which , in the words of CIA veteran and author Tennent Bagley , had " exposed extraordinary slackness of CIA security procedures . " Biography . Nicholson joined the CIA in October 1980 , after having served as captain in a US Army intelligence unit . In his career with the CIA , Nicholson was assigned duties throughout the world ; he worked for the CIA as an operations officer specializing in intelligence operations against foreign intelligence services , including the intelligence services of the USSR and later , the Russian Federation . From 1982 till 1985 , he worked for the CIA in Manila , where he had direct contacts with targeted Soviet officials ; from 1985 till 1987 he worked for the CIA in Bangkok , from 1987 till 1989 in Tokyo . From 1990 till 1992 , he was the CIA Chief of Station in Bucharest , Romania . From 1992 until 1994 , Nicholson was the Deputy Chief of Station / Operations Officer in Kuala Lumpur , Malaysia , where he met with and targeted for recruitment Russian intelligence officers . From 1994 until July , 1996 , Nicholson worked as an instructor at the classified CIA ' s Special Training Center at Camp Peary , Virginia ( also known as " The Farm " ) , teaching CIA trainees intelligence tradecraft . In July , 1996 , he was assigned as a Branch Chief in the Counterterrorism Center , Directorate of Operations , at CIA Headquarters in Langley , Virginia . That position carried a pay grade GS - 15 , his salary being approximately $ 73 , 000 . Despite Nicholson ' s career success , his personal life had suffered , as his constant assignments weighed heavily on his wife and three children , eventually leading to a divorce . Espionage against the United States , FBI investigation and convictions . The FBI affidavit suggests that , while in Kuala Lumpur , Malaysia during 1992 - 1994 , as Deputy Chief of Station / Operations Officer , Nicholson might have been recruited by the Russian intelligence service ( SVR ) while meeting with an officer of the Russian intelligence service in Kuala Lumpur on four occasions during his final months there ; three of those meetings took place in the Russian Embassy in Kuala Lumpur . Those meetings were authorized by the CIA and reported by Nicholson . On June 30 , 1994 , one day after his last reported meeting with the SVR officer , financial records showed that $ 12 , 000 was wired into Nicholson ' s savings account at Selco Credit Union , Eugene , Oregon ; the FBI was unable to trace the source of this money to any legitimate source of income . Nicholson later admitted to providing the RF intelligence service with national defense information , including photographic negatives , between June 1994 and his arrest on November 16 , 1996 . The FBI affidavit implies that the investigation of Nicholson ' s espionage for Russia was triggered by the fact that he had failed to pass 3 polygraph examinations administered by CIA polygraphers as part of his routine security update in October and December 1995 , specifically failing such questions as " Are you hiding involvement with a Foreign Intelligence Service ? " , " Have you had unauthorized contact with a Foreign Intelligence Service ? " , " Since 1990 , have you had contact with a Foreign Intelligence Service that you are trying to hide from the CIA ? " and " Are you trying to hide any contact with a Foreign Intelligence Service since 1990 ? " ; the CIA examiner noted that Nicholson appeared to be trying to manipulate the test by taking deep breaths on the control questions , which stopped after a verbal warning . Nicholson was then placed under surveillance by the FBI . Nicholson was watched during his travels to Thailand , Malaysia and Singapore , where he was seen in unauthorized meetings with Russian intelligence officers . The CIA assigned Nicholson to a management position in the counterterrorism branch at CIA Headquarters , while keeping a close eye on him . The CIA limited his access to information on Russian matters and Chechnya , in particular , which were the primary subjects of interest to his Russian handlers . The FBI also retrieved mail sent from Nicholson to his handlers from local public post box es , where he signed postcard s under the alias " Nevil R . Strachey . " One such postcard had code words requesting a meeting with the SVR in Switzerland in November 1996 . That same month he was scheduled to travel to Europe on official CIA business to meet with European intelligence officers . Nicholson told the CIA he planned to take a personal vacation to Zurich afterwards . On November 16 , 1996 , the FBI arrested Nicholson at Dulles International Airport outside Washington ; he had a ticket to Zurich and a bundle of exposed film and a computer disk bearing classified information from CIA files . Harold Nicholson was convicted of selling U . S . intelligence to Russia for $ 300 , 000 and was sentenced to 23 years 7 months of imprisonment on June 5 , 1997 . He did not get a life without parole or death sentence as prosecutors said he had cooperated fully with them after his arrest . Prosecutors believed that he had sold the identities of all the U . S . intelligence officers stationed in Russia , as well as the identities of his trainees at the CIA school . He told the court that he had intended for the money he received from the Russians to benefit his children . Although his case received far less publicity than that of Aldrich Ames , and apparently caused less damage to U . S . national security , Nicholson was said to be the highest ranking CIA official ever convicted of spying for a foreign power . In court , Nicholson stated he actually was inspired to commit espionage by looking at the case of Aldrich Ames , rather than being deterred by it . At the end of 2008 , his youngest son Nathaniel Nicholson was arrested ; prosecutors said Harold Nicholson had used his son to collect more than $ 47 , 000 from Russian officials in Mexico , Peru and Cyprus for past spy work : between December 2006 and December 2008 Nathaniel had met with representatives of the Russian Federation six times , including twice at a consulate in San Francisco . Harold Nicholson was pulled out of prison to plead in court on charges of conspiracy along with his son . On January 18 , 2011 , Harold Nicholson was sentenced to eight more years in prison , having pleaded guilty to charges of conspiracy to act as an agent of a foreign government and conspiracy to commit money laundering ; five other charges had been dropped as part of the plea deal . Nathaniel Nicholson had been sentenced in December 2010 to five years on probation after making a deal with prosecutors to help build the case against his father . Harold Nicholson is currently incarcerated at the United States Penitentiary , Florence ADX , the federal supermax prison in Colorado , and is scheduled for release in 2024 .