Scheer on Treatment of Wen Ho Lee

* I’d like to commend Robert Scheer for his Sept. 19 commentary, “So Many Left Lee to Twist Slowly, Slowly in the Wind.” As a Korean American woman culturally and an Asian American woman politically, I was all too familiar with the sad case of Wen Ho Lee. I am angry that people in authority lied to keep him in prison. I am angry that he was shackled. And I am horrified that Atty. Gen. Janet Reno refuses to acknowledge a mistake that traumatized so many of us. The Asian American community has been outraged by the treatment of Lee from the outset. What upsets me further is that John Deutch, a former CIA official, was also guilty of downloading thousands of files illegally and may only be charged with a misdemeanor (Sept. 14). To me, that is inarguably a discrepancy that can only be rooted in racism.

This country, despite the progress it has made legally and perhaps ideologically, still houses prejudices against its own rightful citizens. When those prejudices are coupled with governmental power, they can only lead to injustices like the treatment of Lee. It is a shame that a country that prides itself on equality and human rights still views certain ethnic groups as perpetual foreigners.

YUNA CHUNG

Los Angeles

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Scheer glazes over the fact that Lee illegally copied nuclear secrets and took them home (he admitted and pleaded guilty to this charge). Lee then claims to have destroyed seven of the 10 tapes that he copied. The deal that Lee gets is that he goes free and then tells the government what he did with the rest of the tapes. Who’s kidding whom? Lee had no reason to secretly copy the equivalent of 400,000 pages of the government’s nuclear weapons secrets (at 3 a.m. on Christmas Eve, no less) and take them home unless he was going to sell or give them to another country. What does Scheer think Lee was going to do with the information, work at home?

HUGH ROSE

Newhall

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It has been 10 years since I worked for Lockheed in Burbank. I know you do not take classified documents home. Lee would have saved himself a lot of trouble by leaving his work at work. Bottom line, you don’t take secrets home!

RICKY LEROY SAUNDERS

North Hollywood