Engineer denies he confessed to helping China

The Chinese American engineer on trial for allegedly conspiring to send U.S. military technology information to China denied Wednesday government allegations that he confessed to providing sensitive data to his homeland’s military.

Under questioning by defense attorney Ronald O. Kaye, Chi Mak denied telling investigators that he had been sending information to China since 1983. Prosecutors said Mak confessed while he was interrogated in the Santa Ana City Jail two days after his arrest.

The government said Mak admitted using his brother, Tai, to carry information about U.S. military information to Chinese intelligence officials.

Kaye said federal agents video- or audio-taped six interviews with Mak and four co-defendants. The interview in which Mak allegedly confessed was the only one federal investigators did not tape, according to one agent’s testimony.

Mak said he was angered by the agents’ interrogation tactics. He said an agent waved a technical document in front of him and said investigators had recovered it from one of the three computer disks he had tried to send to Hong Kong with his brother.

Mak has maintained the disks contained unclassified information he thought was in the public domain because it was presented at three symposiums open to foreigners. The document the agent showed him was labeled as proprietary information that belonged to his employer, Power Paragon Inc., an Anaheim-based military firm.

Mak said he believed the agent and told him he had made a mistake if the document was included in the disks. He later learned it was not on them. The agent also offered to get him an attorney if he cooperated, he said.

“I was angry and sad -- angry because I feel the interrogation includes a lot of misinterpretations and distortions,” Mak said.

Tai Mak and his wife were arrested Oct. 28, 2005, before boarding a flight to China with the computer disks. The disks contained information about an electric-powered propulsion system for warships, a solid-state power switch for ships and a PowerPoint presentation on the future of power electronics. Chi Mak testified that the information was intended for two old friends in Hong Kong who are also engineers.

But Mak admitted lying to investigators the first time they questioned him. He told them he did not have relatives in China and lied about the number of trips he had taken to his homeland. He also admitted he did not tell them that the disks were also intended for Pu Pei Liang, who lives in Guangzhou.

Prosecutors have said Pu is Mak’s intelligence handler in China. Mak testified that Pu is caretaker for his sister-in-law’s sickly mother and interested in consumer electronics and a magnetic levitation train under construction in Shanghai. Mak testified he had spoken with Pu only three times since 2000.

“I don’t lie normally,” Mak said. “But that night they were pushing me so hard. I was scared.”

He is charged with conspiring to violate export laws, exporting or trying to export military information to China, acting as an agent of the Chinese government and lying to the FBI.

Mak will take the witness stand again today for cross-examination by Assistant U.S. Atty. Gregory W. Staples. The jury is expected to begin deliberations next week.

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hgreza@latimes.com