SAN FRANCISCO — A federal judge has sentenced a former Walnut Creek, California, resident and Twitter employee to 3 1/2 years in prison following his conviction for acting as a foreign agent to the Saudi Arabian royal family, authorities said.
Ahmad Abouammo 44, received a 42-month sentence Wednesday. Stephanie Hinds, the U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of California, announced the sentencing in a news release.
A jury convicted Abouammo in in August of accessing, monitoring and conveying confidential and sensitive information that could be used to identify and locate Twitter users of interest to the Saudi royal family, Hinds said.
U.S. District Judge Edward M. Chen determined the sentence.
“This case revealed that foreign governments will bribe insiders to obtain the user information that is collected and stored by our Silicon Valley social media companies,” Hinds said in a statement. “In handing down today’s sentence, the court emphasized that defendant shared the user information with a foreign government known for not tolerating dissidents.”
Abouammo, a Seattle resident when he was arrested, began receiving the bribes from Saudi Arabian authorities as early as December 2014, according to trial evidence, Hinds said. The evidence also showed that he accepted bribes and gave the Saudi government information on dissidents of Saudi Arabia.
Evidence showed that Abouammo accepted the bribes from a royal family member who was a Saudi Arabian Minister of State and later the Minister of Defense and Deputy Crown Prince, Hinds said.
The Saudi official gave Abouammo a luxury Hublot watch that Abouammo later offered for sale on Craigslist for $42,000, Hinds said. A bank account in Lebanon he later opened in his father’s name received $100,000 in February 2015. Hinds said Abouammo laundered that money by sending it to the United States in small wire transfers with false descriptions.
Hinds said Abouammo received another $100,000 after leaving Twitter for other employment. Abouammo lied to FBI investigators and falsified a document when questioned about his transactions, Hinds said.
FBI agents arrested Abouammo on Nov. 5, 2019. He was ordered to start his sentence on March 31, 2023.
