Aldrich Ames, Notorious CIA Double Agent, Passes Away at 84

Thu Jan 08 2026 20:22:49 GMT+0200 (Eastern European Standard Time)

Aldrich Ames, the CIA officer who infamously sold secrets to the Soviet Union and was considered one of the most damaging double agents in U.S. history, has died aged 84 while serving a life sentence.

Aldrich Ames, who compromised over 100 CIA operations and led to the deaths of several intelligence assets, died in prison on January 6, 2026. His betrayal spanned nearly a decade, during which he sold critical information to the KGB, motivated by financial needs. His case remains a stark reminder of the vulnerabilities in intelligence that can arise from personal crises.

Aldrich Ames, a CIA officer who became one of America's most damaging double agents, has died aged 84.

The former counterintelligence officer, who was serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole, died on Monday at the Federal Correctional Institution in Cumberland, Maryland, CBS News, the BBC's media partner in the US, reported.

Ames was jailed on 28 April 1994 after he admitted to selling secret information to the Soviet Union and later Russia.

He compromised more than 100 clandestine operations and divulged the identities of more than 30 agents spying for the West - leading to the deaths of at least 10 CIA intelligence assets.

Seeking money to pay debts, Ames began providing the KGB with the names of CIA spies in April 1985, receiving an initial payment of $50,000.

Known to the KGB by his code name, Kolokol (The Bell), Ames went on to identify virtually all of the CIA's spies in the Soviet Union, for which he was well rewarded.

To my enduring surprise, the KGB replied that it had set aside for me $2 million in gratitude for the information, he said in an eight-page statement he read to the court.

Over the course of nine years, Ames admitted receiving a total of about $2.5 million from the Soviet Union for his betrayal of the US.

The cash fueled a lavish lifestyle, with Ames splashing out on a new Jaguar car, foreign holidays, and a $540,000 house - despite never having a salary of more than $70,000 a year.

Ames's 31-year career at the CIA began when his father, an analyst at the CIA, helped him land a job there after dropping out of college in 1962.

He married his first wife, fellow CIA agent Nancy Segebarth, in 1969, before being sent to Turkey as a counterintelligence officer to recruit foreign agents.

Three years later, he was brought back to the US, where his problems with alcohol began to emerge and his marriage began to collapse.

Despite several security violations, including leaving classified information on the subway, Ames was then sent to Mexico City in 1981.

There he met his second wife, Maria del Rosario Casas Dupuy, a cultural attaché at the Colombian embassy and a CIA asset who would later be charged as his accomplice.

Returning to the US in 1983, Ames became head of the CIA's Soviet counterintelligence department, despite continuing concerns over his drinking.

His career was soaring, but his personal life was spiraling. A rising debt led him to sell secrets to the Soviets.

His treachery began in 1985 when he gave the Soviets the names of a few KGB officers working for the FBI in exchange for $50,000.

His espionage continued until his arrest on February 21, 1994, following a mole hunt that had begun a year prior.

Ames cooperated with authorities in exchange for a plea deal that secured a lenient sentence for Rosario, who admitted knowledge of the money and his meetings with the Soviets.

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