Retired top FBI agent in NYC is charged with violating sanctions on Russia, working with oligarch

A former head of the counterintelligence division in the FBI’s New York City office has been arrested on charges of working for a sanctioned Russian oligarch and concealing payments he received from a former foreign security officer during his time in the bureau.

The charges against Charles McGonigall, announced in parallel by the U.S. attorney’s offices in Manhattan and Washington on Monday, came as an embarrassing disclosure for the FBI, embroiling a former lawman who was once among the agency’s most senior officials.

McGonigal retired from the FBI in 2018 after a two-decade career that included Russian foreign counterintelligence work. He was arrested Saturday along with a Russian American court interpreter, according to the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan.

Court papers said McGonigal and the court interpreter, Sergey Shestakov, worked in 2021 for the oligarch, Oleg Deripaska, probing one of his Russian rivals in exchange for secret payments.

Through their work, McGonigal, 54, and Shestakov, 69, violated sanctions imposed on Deripaska in 2018, according to an unsealed multi-count indictment filed in New York.

McGonigal knew that the work violated the sanctions, and had attempted to have the measures lifted after leaving the FBI, the charging papers said.

In a statement, Damian Williams, the U.S. attorney in Manhattan, said that McGonigal and Shestakov “should have known better.”

McGonigal pleaded not guilty before a magistrate judge on Monday afternoon and was to be released on $500,000 bond. A judge imposed travel restrictions, and he surrendered his passport.

Shestakov also pleaded not guilty and was to be released on $250,000 bond. He faced electronic monitoring until he relinquished his passport.

A lawyer for McGonigal, Seth DuCharme, did not immediately reply to requests for comment. Calls to a phone listed for McGonigal were not answered. Shestakov’s attorney, Bennett Epstein, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

McGonigal and Shestakov were charged with money laundering and violating the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, a 1977 law that the U.S. uses to sanction foreign countries. Each of four counts facing the two men carry maximum sentences of 20 years in prison.

Shestakov was also charged with one count of making false statements, which carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison.

“The FBI is committed to the enforcement of economic sanctions designed to protect the United States and our allies, especially against hostile activities of a foreign government and its actors,” Michael Driscoll, assistant director in charge of the FBI’s New York office, said in a statement.

“There are no exceptions for anyone,” Driscoll added, “including a former FBI official.”

Citing Russian aggression in Ukraine, the U.S. Treasury Department placed Deripaska, 55, on a list of sanctioned individuals in 2018.

At the time, the U.S. presented Deripaska, a metals baron, as a malignant actor apparently operating on behalf of the Russian government and under a cloud of alarming accusations. Deripaska was said to have ordered the execution of a businessman, and to have engaged in extortion and racketeering.

McGonigal and Shestakov attempted to cover their tracks by avoiding using Deripaska’s name in digital messages and using shell companies to send and receive payments from the oligarch, among other methods, according to the U.S. government.

Over a 22-year career at the FBI, McGonigal investigated the 9/11 terror acts, led high-wattage espionage probes in Washington and served as the chief of the cyber-counterintelligence coordination section at the FBI’s national headquarters.

In late 2016, McGonigal was named special agent in charge of the counterintelligence division at the FBI’s New York field office.

The U.S. attorney’s office in Washington said McGonigal’s crimes began before left the FBI in 2018.

Beginning in August 2017, McGonigal concealed from the bureau a relationship he had with a onetime Albanian security officer who later served as an FBI source, according to a nine-count indictment filed in Washington.

McGonigal allegedly received more than $225,000 from the individual, who was not named in court papers, but identified as a New Jersey resident.

Court papers described McGonigal receiving payments in the fall of 2017, including an $80,000 handoff in a parked car outside a New York City restaurant, and other handoffs at the individual’s New Jersey residence.

That case did not implicate Shestakov.

A court date for the case in Washington had not been set as of Monday, the U.S attorney’s office said. The case was conducted by FBI offices in Washington and Los Angeles.

“Mr. McGonigal betrayed his solemn oath to the United States in exchange for personal gain and at the expense of our national security,” Donald Alway, the assistant director in charge of the FBI’s Los Angeles office, said in a statement. “McGonigal is alleged to have committed the very violations he swore to investigate.”