Jonathan Idema - Lithuania and Nuclear Weapons Smuggling

Lithuania and Nuclear Weapons Smuggling

In 1993 Idema was contracted to train police forces in the former Soviet republic of Lithuania. After his return, he contacted officials from both the Pentagon and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), claiming to have uncovered a conspiracy by the Russian Mafia to smuggle nuclear material out of Lithuania. According to Idema, FBI agents demanded he provide the names of his contacts. He refused, claiming that the FBI was infiltrated by KGB agents and that his sources would have been killed.

It was around this time that Idema was being investigated for wire fraud and eventually convicted in 1994. Idema asserted that the fraud charges were fabricated by FBI agent Earl Edwin Pitts, who he claims supervised the case against him, in retaliation for Idema's earlier refusal to provide sources in the smuggling plot. However, the FBI began their investigation into Idema's activities as early as May 1991, before he even approached the Bureau about Lithuania. Furthermore, there is no evidence that Pitts was involved in any capacity in the fraud case against Idema.