CIA officer Aldrich Ames paid cash for a $540,000 house on a salary under $70,000; he and his wife forfeited the proceeds, and she went to prison while their son lived in Bogotá

Aldrich Ames worked in CIA counterintelligence against the Soviet Union. From 1985 he gave the KGB the names of Western agents. By 1 May 1989 the KGB had paid him more than $1.8 million and set aside another $900,000. He and his Colombian-born wife, Rosario, paid cash for a $540,000 house in Arlington, Virginia, and a new Jaguar while he earned less than $70,000 a year. The CIA's most important Soviet sources arrested in autumn 1985 were all executed; the government said at least 10 people he exposed were killed. The couple were arrested in 1994. On 28 April 1994 both pleaded guilty and signed agreements giving the United States the proceeds of the espionage. Ames received life without parole. In October 1994 Judge Claude Hilton in Alexandria sentenced Rosario to 63 months, the lowest term her plea allowed. She had asked for leniency to care for their son Paul, five, who was living with relatives in Bogotá. About $547,000 of the forfeited assets went to the Justice Department's victims fund^†. After her release she returned to Colombia with Paul^†. Ames admitted receiving about $2.5 million in all. He died in a federal prison in Maryland on 5 January 2026, aged 84.