Lee Wen-ho (李文和), the former Taiwan-born Los Alamos scientist who was charged with security violations and jailed for nine months, may be on a collision course with the government over whether he has violated security rules in the handling of his forthcoming autobiography.
The dispute puts the federal government in an awkward position. Critics said that the government imprisoned Lee because of his ethnic background, and federal officials are wary of tangling with him again since they could face new accusations of racism. But other would-be authors who fall under the same security rules as Lee, as well as some federal officials, say fairness demands that the government deal with Lee no differently than anyone else if he has broken the rules.
Individuals like Lee who receive security clearances, especially high-level ones that give access to nuclear secrets, pledge to submit any manuscripts to federal censors before letting other people see them. The aim is to prevent the inadvertent release of government secrets.
Lee submitted his manuscript to federal censors in July, three months before its intended publication, in October. Federal and private security experts said the submission for security review was belated and raised the question of whether people other than the author -- like his co-author and his editor, among others -- had seen the manuscript. If so, he could have violated federal rules and in theory could find himself facing new charges and penalties.
One person who admitted reading the manuscript, and who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said that at least five people had seen it and that it contained nothing that would get Lee in trouble. "This is not national secrets he's revealing," the person said. "It's a nice little story."
Joseph Davis, a spokesman for the Department of Energy, which runs Los Alamos and is reviewing Lee's manuscript, said the agency would make no exception to its rules for the scientist. "We're not going to shortcut that process or cut any corners for anybody," he said.
Normally, Davis added, if the government finds that a manuscript under review has been distributed to other people and contains secrets, "then it becomes a question of whether the US Justice Department would pursue that" to see if laws were broken.
Mark Holscher, one of Lee's lawyers, said the scientist would have no comment. "From our perspective," he said, "Lee is following the procedures that we believe are required by law for the publication of his book."
Lee's book, My Country Versus Me: The First-Hand Account by the Los Alamos Scientist Who Was Falsely Accused of Being a Spy, is described as an autobiography and was written with Helen Zia, a journalist. It will be published by Hyperion Books. While the book is scheduled for publication in October the dispute over the security rules and over whether his manuscript contains federal secrets could delay its publication, the security experts say.
Will Schwalbe, the book's editor and the editor in chief of Hyperion Books, which is based in New York, defended Lee's actions and denounced any attempt to slow the book's publication.
"The way he was treated was a disgrace," Schwalbe said, referring to how the government handled Lee's case. "If there were attempts made to stop this book's publication or hinder it, that would add to the disgrace." He said he believed that Lee is a "patriotic American who has no intention whatsoever of revealing any classified information."
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