America's 'most dangerous' Soviet spy dies in prison

Robert Hanssen, pictured in prison after his arrest in 2001, was found dead in a maximum security prison in Colorado. Photo: Polaris/eevine

America's «most destructive spy» who spied for Russia during and after the Cold War for more than two decades has been found dead in prison.

79-year-old Robert Hanssen has been found unconscious in a maximum security facility in Florence, Colorado, where he was serving a life sentence.

Hansen was one of the FBI's most notorious spies, but his work as a double agent for Moscow went unnoticed for years.

Three hundred agents worked on his case. At the time of his arrest, he asked, «What's keeping you so long?»

Robert Hanssen, a former FBI agent, spied from time to time for Moscow in the 2000s. Photo: Reuters

Hanssen became a double agent in 1979 and occasionally spied for Moscow under pseudonyms such as «Ramon Garcia» in the 2000s.

His clues included revealing that the US government had dug a tunnel under the Soviet embassy in Washington. to eavesdrop on his employees.

He also told Moscow about three KGB officers who were secretly spying for America. Two of them were later executed.

In exchange for handing over state secrets, Hanssen received about $1.4 million in cash, bank funds and diamonds from Moscow.

To this day, the FBI describes him as «the most dangerous spy in the bureau's history.»

The Bureau began hunting him after the 1994 arrest of Aldrich Ames, a CIA agent who also spied for Russia.

Former FBI agent Robert Hansen's ID and business card window display at the FBI Academy in Quantico. Photo: PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP

But it wasn't until 2000 that investigators finally stumbled upon Hanssen, when the FBI obtained an audio recording of the double agent from a former Russian intelligence officer. leaving classified material for his Russian handlers under a wooden footbridge.

He told investigators that the FBI's lax security amounted to «criminal negligence» but pleaded guilty to 15 counts of espionage to avoid the death penalty. In 2002, he was sentenced to life in prison without parole.

He told the FBI that he was inspired as a teenager by Kim Philby, a British spy turned Russian agent.

Hanssen led a double life in many ways: outwardly anti-communist and devout Catholic, father of six children, but frequenter of strip clubs who secretly filmed pornographic videos of his wife.

He was found unresponsive on his cell phone Monday morning. The cause of death has not yet been confirmed.