Federal Judge Revokes Citizenship of Chinese Couple in Trade Secrets Theft

A federal judge in San Diego, California, revoked the U.S. citizenship of a married couple from China on March 30 after they pleaded guilty to stealing trade secrets from an Ohio research hospital. Yu Zhou and Li Chen, who had worked as scientists at Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus, lost their naturalized status due to crimes that demonstrated a lack of good moral character required for citizenship.

U.S. District Judge James Simmons Jr. granted the Justice Department's request, ruling that the couple's convictions for conspiracy to commit wire fraud and theft of trade secrets involved moral turpitude. Federal law permits revocation of naturalized citizenship if it was obtained through concealment of material facts or misrepresentations during the immigration process. The couple had naturalized in 2016 and 2017, respectively, after entering the United States on H-1B visas for skilled workers in 2007 and 2008.

Prosecutors detailed how Chen and Zhou, employed in separate research labs at the hospital for about a decade, conspired to steal proprietary information on exosome isolation used in pediatric medical treatments. They founded a biotech company in China to develop...