Sailor sentenced to 18 years in prison for espionage

A Navy chief convicted of selling military secrets was released on dishonorable charges and sentenced to 18 years in prison Wednesday in a courtroom at Naval Base San Diego.

Fire Chief Bryce Pedicini was found guilty of multiple counts of espionage and attempted espionage following a seven-day trial in April.

Pedicini told the judge in an unsworn statement Tuesday that he knew the choices he made were “foolish and wrong.” He said he never intended to harm the country he served.

Prosecutors said the leader was “very intelligent” and knew what he was doing was wrong. But he still tried to “take advantage of his (security) clearance.”

During the alleged trial in 2022, Pedicini met a woman on Facebook when she sent him a direct message. She said she was a Japanese researcher and offered to pay Pedicini for a series of articles on U.S. Navy strategy and capabilities.

Pedicini, who at the time was in debt and had a negative bank balance, agreed, prosecutors said.

Prosecutors said the woman was actually an intelligence agent for a foreign government. They did not specify which country she was working in. Parts of the trial and sentencing hearing were closed to the public to discuss classified information.

As a fire controller, specializing in the AEGIS missile system, Pedicini held a security clearance and had access to classified information.

He received $1,000 per research paper, prosecutors said, for a total payment of $8,000.

In 2023, Pedicini was sent to the guided-missile destroyer USS Higgins in Japan, where he offered the woman more classified information in exchange for more money.

He took his cell phone into a classified work area and took photos of a classified network computer screen. The photo was to serve as a menu for the agent to choose the classified documents he wanted.

When Pedicini went to upload this photo for the officer, he was arrested.

He pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of bringing his phone into the classified space before his trial in April.

His convictions for eight types of espionage and attempted espionage each earned him sentences of more than 10 years. His longest sentence, 18 years, was for his attempt to sell classified information from Higgins' computer network.

The judge, Cmdr. Andrea Lockhart ordered Pedicini to serve his sentences concurrently. Prosecutors had requested Tuesday that the leader be sentenced to 52 years in prison with consecutive sentences.

The defense on Tuesday requested only a maximum prison sentence of 18 months.