Chinese scientist gets 10 years in prison for rice theft plot

A Chinese scientist has been sentenced to more than ten years in prison after being found guilty of conspiring to steal samples of genetically modified rice.

District Judge Carlos Murguia, of the US District Court for the District of Kansas, gave 121 months to Weiqiang Zhang after he was found guilty of three charges in February 2017.

Evidence at trial established that Zhang had worked as a rice breeder for biopharmaceutical research facility Ventria Bioscience in Kansas.

Ventria develops genetically programmed rice to express recombinant human proteins. The proteins are then extracted for use in the therapeutic and medical fields.

Without authorisation, Zhang acquired hundreds of Ventria’s rice seeds and stored them at his residence.

The rice seeds were developed to produce either human serum albumin, which is contained in blood, or lactoferrin, an iron-binding protein found in human milk, among other things.

“Ventria spent millions of dollars and years of research developing its seeds and cost-effective methods to extract the proteins, which are used to develop lifesaving products for global markets,” said a release from the US Department of Justice (DoJ), published yesterday, April 4.

In 2013, personnel from a crop research institute in China visited Zhang. Soon after, US Customs and Border Protection officers found seeds belonging to Ventria in the luggage of Zhang’s visitors as they were leaving the US.

Acting assistant attorney general John Cronan of the DoJ’s Criminal Division said: “Today’s sentence demonstrates the significant consequences awaiting those who would steal trade secrets from American companies.”

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