The conviction of a University of Tennessee-Knoxville professor emeritus on charges related to illegally sharing information with a foreign government has spurred fellow academics, including those at Vanderbilt, to more closely examine their collaborations with the international scientific community.
UT’s Engineering Professor Emeritus J. Reece Roth was convicted on Sept. 3 for illegally exporting information to foreign countries and is awaiting federal sentencing.
“I was surprised by Professor Roth's arrest and conviction. I am certain that he felt that he was not in violation of the law,” said Dean of the School of Engineering Kenneth Galloway.
According to the Department of Justice, the information that Roth, who specializes in industrial plasma and fusion, exported was related to military technical information that could aid in the designing of weapons and surveillance drones.
“We haven’t had any problems like Professor Roth’s in the past. Now there is more tension about the topic because it is closer to home. But I think it is possible to happen anywhere,” said Director of the Office of Sponsored Research John Childress. “The law is the law and it covers you no matter which institution you are part of.”
“Faculty and students in the School of Engineering work with a number of international collaborators on topics of mutual technical interest,” Galloway said. “Personally, I have recently returned from a Technical Conference in Finland at which Vanderbilt researchers presented papers co-authored with collaborators from the U.K. and Belgium. We have many other international collaborations in the School of Engineering.”
According to a Department of Justice document, Roth was convicted of one count of conspiring with a technology company and a citizen of the People’s Republic of China (also a graduate student) to unlawfully export 15 different "defense articles.“ He was also convicted of 15 counts of violating the Arms Export Control Act and other charges.
Roth could face up to five years in prison on the conspiracy conviction and ten years on each of the Arms Export convictions; fines could be in an excess of a $1 million.
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