Sherry Chen
Sherry Chen's Story
A recent case of Chinese American surveillance, Sherry Chen’s story demonstrates how easily one’s life can easily be disrupted regardless of the veracity of claims and without any consequence for the prosecution or government. Born in Beijing, Sherry Chen moved to the United States in 1992 to pursue further education in water resources and climatology at the University of Nebraska before becoming a naturalized US citizen in 1997. She would eventually work for the National Weather Service based in Ohio in 2007 after an 11 year tenure with the state of Missouri until a series of circumstances resulted in the loss of her job and disruption to her life.
Timeline of Events
1997 - became a naturalized US citizen
2007 - joined the NWS as a hydrologist developing predictive flood models of Ohio
The only woman of color and Chinese American on staff at the NWS, Chen was described by her colleagues as hardworking and dedicated.
2012 - as part of her annual trip to visit family in Beijing, met with China’s vice minister of Water Resources (former classmate)
Her meeting was prompted by a nephew whose father-in-law had a dispute with government officials. Initially reluctant to meet her former classmate, Chen decided to meet with him to help her family. During this meeting, the vice minister would ask Chen how water projects are funded within the US to which Chen didn’t know the answer.
2012 - upon return to the US, collected publicly available resources for her classmate’s questions about the US water system as well as used an office-shared password to access private information for work purposes
This was all sent through her work email and from direct contact with her supervisor and co-workers, behavior which would later be noted as extremely transparent activity for an alleged spy.
October 20th 2014 - arrested at work under suspicions of accessing data with a stolen password for the purpose of giving national security information to China facing 25 years in prison and $1 million in fines
The high-profile arrest at her office shook Chen’s life to its core. Without pay, her family in China had to provide funds for her legal defense and the news quickly spread in her small community in Ohio. Friends avoided visiting Chen out of fear and the heavy media scrutiny placed so much pressure on Chen that she could only cry and couldn’t sleep or eat in the lead up to the trial.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f5M_phGnJ_U
March 2015 - charges against Chen are dropped a week before trial was scheduled
With charges dropped, the worst outcomes of imprisonment and fines were avoided; however, the stress and anxiety of the process would continue to follow Chen even as she returned to work.
March 2016 - Chen is terminated from the NWS due to the charges brought against her in 2014-15
Her termination was based on untrustworthy conduct, misuse of databases, and lack of candor, all factors which almost certainly stemmed from Chen’s arrest a year prior.
April 23rd 2018 - won an appeal at the Merit Systems Protection Board to have her job at the NWS reinstated due to her wrongful termination, decision was appealed by the DOC without resolution
Despite the ruling, Chen has not been reinstated due to a pending appeal from the Commerce Department. Even throughout this process, Chen continues to lack pay for her work and continues to suffer from insomnia from the stress and emotional trauma of the investigation. Despite her treatment, Chen retains her passion for her NWS work describing it as “her life” and being extremely proud of it.
The Significance of Sherry Chen's Story
As the only woman of color at the Ohio NWS office and being Chinese-American, questions of loyalty were quickly leveled at Sherry Chen. She was singled out for practices which were common in her office and for her contact in China. Despite transparently discussing the contents of her meeting in China with her boss, Sherry Chen was, in the eyes of the DOC and DOJ, a malicious actor. Even with the charges against her dropped, Sherry Chen continues to experience the trauma of the investigation having been terminated and barred from future employment at her dream job at the NWS without recourse. Chen’s experience is telling of how the modern-day criminal justice apparatus interfaces with Chinese-American identity and the stereotypes attached to the label.