Colonel Charged As Soviet Spy

A retired Army Reserve colonel was accused of spying for the Soviet Union and Russia for 25 years Wednesday after being arrested in a government sting aimed at some unfinished business from the Cold War.

George Trofimoff, 73, allegedly sold military secrets to the Soviets when he was a civilian employee of the U.S. Army at an installation in West Germany where refugees and defectors from the Soviet bloc were interrogated. The charges could bring life in prison.

Soon after, prosecutors unsealed a federal indictment detailing the espionage charge against him—that he gave the Soviets "documents, photographs, photographic negatives and information relating to the national defense of the United States."

The indictment said the Russians paid Trofimoff and gave him an award for bravery. Frank Gallagher, agent in charge of the FBI's Tampa office, said Trofimoff was paid $250,000 over the course of his 25-year spy career.

Trofimoff was arrested at a Tampa hotel after meeting with an FBI agent who was posing as a Russian operative delivering a payment. His wife, Jutta—who authorities said was not involved—was waiting in their car.

At a hearing, U.S. Magistrate Judge Mark Pizzo ordered Trofimoff held without bail and gave him a court-appointed attorney.

Trofimoff was born in Germany to Russian parents and became a U.S. citizen in 1951. He joined the Army in 1953, served for three years and in 1959 was hired to a civilian working in military intelligence.

The indictment said he sold classified information he obtained while serving as a civilian chief of the U.S. Army element of the Nuremburg Joint Interrogation Center in Germany from 1969 to 1994.

Prosecutors said Trofimoff used his unlimited access to classified information at the center to tell the KGB what the United States knew about the Soviets and their allies. Trofimoff also knew of weaknesses in American intelligence-gathering and passed that information on to the KGB, the indictment said.

Trofimoff also received the Order of the Red Banner, the Soviet award presented for bravery and self-sacrifice in the defense of the socialist homeland, prosecutors said. The Soviet Union broke apart in 1991.

The indictment said Trofimoff was recruited into the KGB by a boyhood friend, Igor Vladimirovich Susemihl, a Russian Orthodox priest who served as the Archbishop of Vienna and Austria and temporary Archbishop of Baden and Bavaria.

Trofimoff allegedly took documents from the his work and photographed them, passing the film on to Susemihl and other KGB officers during meetings in Austria. The indictment also notes eight meetings between Trofimoff and KGB officers, naming the KGB agents in three instances.

Trofimoff and Susemihl were arrested in Germany in 1994 on espionage charges, but were releaed when German officials could not prove their case within the five-year statute of limitations. Trofimoff told German authorities the money he received from Susmihl were personal loans.

There is no statute of limitations for spying under U.S. law.

Susemihl died in 1999.

Trofimoff's current residence is in an area popular with retired military officers.

"He's a very good neighbor and a good friend," said one resident, John Callaway. "These people are wonderful people. What happened, that's way in the past."