Víctor Manuel Rocha, a former US diplomat who served as a virtual ambassador to Argentina, was sentenced to 15 years in prison. He admitted to conspiracy to act as an agent of a foreign government, crimes that could put him behind bars for several years.
He was arrested in Miami on December 1, after an exhaustive FBI investigation, which included the work of an undercover agent who posed as a Cuban spy. The conditions were not revealed, but it is assumed that RochA knows many secrets of the Cuban government that he could reveal. The criminal complaint did not provide details about what information he might have disclosed to Cuba or how it might have influenced U.S. policy. The former diplomat spent decades in the US State Department and served in Buenos Aires between 1997 and 2000 as the top US representative in the country, as the embassy did not have an official envoy, although his title was Chargé d'Affaires. He then went as ambassador to Bolivia and years later he left diplomacy to dedicate himself to private business.