Ex-FBI agent Charles McGonigal sentenced for helping Russian oligarch

Charles McGonigal, 55, pleaded guilty in August to money laundering and conspiracy charges

A former top FBI agent has been sentenced to over four years in prison for helping a Russian oligarch spy on a rival.

Charles McGonigal, 55, pleaded guilty in August to one count of conspiring to launder money.

McGonigal is one of the highest-ranking FBI agents to ever be charged with a crime.

He is also accused of hiding $225,000 (£176,000) in payments from an Albanian agent while still working for the FBI.

Prosecutors had asked for five years in prison.

Before his sentence was handed down on Thursday in New York, McGonigal expressed regret over his actions.

"I committed a felony and as a former FBI special agent it causes me extreme emotional and physical pain," he told Judge Jennifer Rearden, according to ABC News. "I stand before you today with a deep sense of remorse."

Ms Rearden said McGonigal had made "extraordinary contributions" through his counter-espionage work, but called his crimes "extraordinarily serious".

McGonigal was the special agent in charge of the FBI's counterintelligence division in New York before retiring in 2018. In that role, he was tasked with investigating Russian oligarchs.

Prosecutors say he and former Russian diplomat Sergey Shestakov violated US sanctions by agreeing to provide services to Russian billionaire and industrialist Oleg Deripaska.

The US sanctioned Mr Deripaska in 2018 after accusing him and several other Russian oligarchs and officials of "malign activity around the globe".

Prosecutors alleged the two men agreed to help Mr Deripaska get his sanctions removed. They also promised to investigate a rival oligarch, Vladimir Potanin.

• US charges ex-FBI agent with violating Russia sanctions

The men and an associate of Mr Deripaska allegedly used shell companies to send and receive payments from Mr Deripaska.

In August, McGonigal admitted to a judge that he had investigated Mr Potanin in an effort to add him to the sanctions list.

He told the court he was "deeply remorseful" for his actions.

"I take full responsibility and never intended to hurt the US, FBI or my family," he said, according to local New York outlets.

After being arrested in January, the ex-FBI agent had initially pleaded not guilty before later reversing his plea.

In court filings, prosecutors said McGonigal "abused the skills and influence his country entrusted him with by secretly working for the very threats he had previously protected it against".

"No one knew better the gravity of McGonigal's crimes than McGonigal himself," they wrote.

Defence attorneys for McGonigal, meanwhile, have claimed that his fall from grace and loss of job are enough punishment.

McGonigal has also pleaded guilty to separate charges. In that case, he is accused of concealing thousands of dollars in cash from a former Albanian intelligence employee in 2017. McGonigal has claimed the money was part of a loan for a business.

Federal prosecutors say he was required to report the payment. He is scheduled to be sentenced in that Washington, DC case in February 2024.