Retired Engineer Pleads Guilty to Selling Defense Secrets : Court: The former aerospace worker tried to sell documents to undercover FBI agent.

A retired aerospace engineer admitted in federal court Tuesday that he tried to sell classified defense information for $100,000 to a man he believed was a representative of France but turned out to be an undercover FBI agent.

John Douglas Charlton pleaded guilty before U. S. District Court Judge Harry L. Hupp to two counts of attempted transfer of defense information and could face a maximum 20 years in prison when he is sentenced Jan. 8.

But as part of the plea agreement, both sides will recommend no more than 24 months in prison for Charlton, 62, a former Lockheed and Bendix employee who lives with his elderly mother in Lancaster, and was described as more misguided and eccentric than dangerous.

“We’re certainly not making an example out of him for no reason,” Assistant U. S. Atty. George B. Newhouse Jr. said after the hearing in Downtown Los Angeles. But Newhouse acknowledged the federal government also hoped that Charlton’s case would serve as a deterrent in a region hard-hit by defense-industry cutbacks. Newhouse said the last case involving an aerospace engineer selling defense secrets was in the early 1980s.

“We want to send a very stern message to perhaps the thousands of still laid-off engineers in Southern California that . . . anyone with similar temptations will be dealt with in a very severe manner,” Newhouse said.

Charlton’s attorney, Donald C. Randolph, declined to comment until after his client is sentenced. “There’s nothing I can say of any substance at this time. We negotiated a plea agreement that significantly reduces his exposure so I think the best posture is to not make a comment at this time.”

The engineer and inventor “came to the attention of the FBI” several years ago after he let it be known that he was interested in selling classified information he had once worked on to a foreign government, albeit one friendly to the United States, Newhouse said Tuesday, declining to explain how federal agents learned of Charlton’s plans.

Soon after, Charlton was contacted by an undercover FBI agent posing as a representative of the French government. That country was chosen for no other reason than it seemed like one of the Western European powers that Charlton would be interested in dealing with, Newhouse said Tuesday in an effort to quell any diplomatic misunderstandings.

The two men met five times between July and September, 1993, at the Desert Inn on Sierra Highway in Lancaster. Authorities say Charlton, who retired from Lockheed in 1989, offered information “concerning a number of highly classified Defense programs,” including Lockheed’s Sea Shadow ship and the Navy’s Captor Mine Program, which is an anti-submarine weapons system.

Last May 25, a federal grand jury investigating the matter returned a 10-count indictment against Charlton alleging attempted espionage. In an interview, Charlton said he was only trying to raise money to build his latest invention, a “lung-cleaning machine,” and ensure that NATO had access to the defense technology he had helped develop.

Tuesday, speaking softly and wearing a conservative black business suit, the burly Charlton admitted trying to sell electrical blueprints of the Captor program that he helped design while working at Bendix.

Newhouse said that even though the program itself was no longer classified, much of the underlying technology remained so. Newhouse said Charlton had taken the documents from his former employers without authorization.

Charlton may not have been “inherently vicious like others trying to sell out their country,” Newhouse said, but nonetheless had been wrong.

“I think he posed a threat and fortunately the FBI was ever-diligent and able to intercede,” Newhouse said.