Another brilliant scheme

This whole thing sounds like one of those Ben Affleck/Matt Damon movies that come on Cinemax at 3 in the afternoon. The deal is that the FBI arrested a couple from Annapolis - a Navy nuclear engineer and his wife, a humanities teacher at a local high school - and charged them with trying over and over to sell US nuclear submarine secrets to a foreign country.

The ALLEGED scoundrel is one Jonathan Toebbe, holder of a top-secret clearance, who, according to charging documents, “has passed, and continues to pass, Restricted Data as defined by the Atomic Energy Act . . . to a foreign government . . . with the witting assistance of his spouse, Diana Toebbe."

Mrs Toebbe's classes will have substitute teachers for the foreseeable future. She is listed as a faculty member at the private pre-K-12 Key School in Annapolis, with a Ph.D. to her name, which maybe she can hang on the cell wall when she "goes away." Maybe her classes will get to see movies about Benedict Arnold and Vidkun Quisling!

Anyway, the court papers say that last year, the FBI came into possession of a package of Navy documents that had been sent to a foreign country as yet unnamed, along with instructions on how to carry on transactions in official Top Secret Code. The letter said: “I apologize for this poor translation into your language. Please forward this letter to your military intelligence agency. I believe this information will be of great value to your nation. This is not a hoax.”

The FBI then began corresponding with the person offering for sale nuclear sub secrets, including the top-secret pamphlet and instruction manual, "So You Want To Build a Nuclear Submarine!"

So Toebbe thought he was being a double-naught spy, making thrilling international deals, while all along he was webchatting with some desk jockey at the FBI building. 

And after the FBI guy gained Toebbe's trust, he told the spy he would help arrange for $100,000 worth of cryptocurrency, in exchange for the secrets.

Are you ready for the part I love? 

The FBI told Toebbe to make the drop in Jefferson County, West Virginia, and that's where the agency recovered a 16-gigabyte data card concealed inside a peanut butter and jelly sandwich all wrapped up nicely inside a baggie.

 For another $20,000, the FBI got more data cards: one hidden in a Band-Aid wrapper and another inside a pack of chewing gum.

Toebbe's wife is charged with acting as lookout during these clandestine operations.

The couple will make their first of many appearances in court today.  By the way, these $3 billion dollar submarines are called Virginia-class subs, and they carry cruise missiles, using “the latest in stealth, intelligence-gathering, and weapons system technology,” according to court papers.  

I'm sure these two fine upstanding Americans planned to live it up on the French Riviera with their newfound fortune, while back home, the movie version of their exploits was filmed with Damon, and maybe Jennifer Garner as the wife. 

Or not.

All we know for sure is, some FBI agent has peanut butter all over his hands.