Former Google software engineer Linwei Ding just scored a big victory in court right before his sentencing. US District Judge Vince Chhabria tossed out seven convictions for economic espionage against him, ruling that federal prosecutors simply did not have enough evidence to prove Ding was acting on behalf of the Chinese government when he copied confidential files.
That said, he is not walking away scot-free. The legal battle surrounding the ex-Google engineer Linwei Ding conviction leaves seven counts of trade secret theft completely intact. This means he still faces serious prison time for taking proprietary AI tech.
Why the espionage charges collapsed in court
Back in January, a jury originally found Ding guilty on all 14 counts after a two-week trial. Prosecutors proved that between spring 2022 and spring 2023, Ding copied 1,255 confidential documents—roughly 14,000 pages—from his company laptop into a personal cloud storage account. The files contained blueprints for the hardware infrastructure and software platforms Google uses to train massive AI models and reduce reliance on third-party chips like Nvidia.
However, Judge Chhabria discovered a major hole in the government’s case of espionage. While evidence showed “overwhelmingly” that Ding stole secrets to boost his own startup, Zhisuan Technology, the claim he did it to benefit the Chinese government fell flat.
The prosecution pointed to Ding’s later applications to Chinese talent programs and meetings with local officials in late 2023. But the judge noted those events happened months after he uploaded the files. This makes it far too speculative to claim he had that exact intention when the actual theft took place, Reuters reports.
“Disorganized and feeble” rather than a mastermind operative
Judge Chhabria did not mince words when describing the defendant’s actions. He called Ding’s methods “ad hoc, disorganized, and feeble.” The judge said Ding appeared to be making things up as he went along, not like a trained operative carrying out a high-level state plan.
The judge also shut down the government’s backup argument—that Ding committed espionage when downloading those files to a personal laptop in December 2023—because prosecutors never presented that timeline to the jury during trial. As constitutional protections against double jeopardy apply, Ding gets a direct acquittal on those seven espionage counts instead of facing a new trial.
What lies ahead for sentencing
Throwing out the espionage charges removes a massive burden, as each of those counts carried up to 15 years in prison and a $5 million fine. Defense attorney Grant Fondo publicly celebrated the ruling, stating his team was gratified by the court’s decision.
Ding remains out on bond while he prepares for his official sentencing hearing on September 1. Even without the espionage charges, his seven trade secret theft convictions still carry a maximum sentence of up to 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine per count.
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