The FBI announced on Thursday a $200,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of Monica Elfriede Witt, whom prosecutors charged in 2019 with espionage after alleging she shared highly classified U.S. intelligence with Iran.
The bureau said Witt defected to Iran in 2013 and remains at large, residing in Iran at this time. The FBI listed Witt as a native of El Paso, Texas, 5 feet 6 inches tall and weighing 120 pounds, and said she is known to speak Farsi and has no other alias. "Monica Witt allegedly betrayed her oath to the Constitution more than a decade ago by defecting to Iran and providing the Iranian regime National Defense Information and likely continues to support their nefarious activities," Daniel Wierzbicki said.
The reward marks the most concrete public incentive from U.S. authorities in a case that prosecutors laid out in a February 2019 indictment. That charging document accused Witt of sharing information about a classified Defense Department program with the Iranian government and alleged she assisted Tehran's intelligence services in targeting her former colleagues in the U.S. government.
Prosecutors say Witt, who entered the Air Force in 1997 and left in 2008, served as an Air Force intelligence specialist and as a special agent for the Air Force Office of Special Investigations. She continued working as a Defense Department contractor until 2010. Her work, the FBI said, provided access to secret and top-secret information related to foreign intelligence and counterintelligence, including the true names of U.S. intelligence personnel in undercover roles.
The timeline in the indictment describes travel to Iran in 2012 for a conference that prosecutors say criticized American moral standards and promoted anti-U.S. propaganda. Prosecutors allege she returned in 2013, was given housing and computer equipment by Iranian officials, and thereafter began working on behalf of Tehran by sharing classified information and gathering intelligence on former U.S. intelligence colleagues. Authorities say she worked with Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. The same 2019 indictment charged four Iranians with conspiracy and aggravated identity theft; the indictment accused those individuals of helping Witt gather information on her former U.S. government colleagues.
The FBI's announcement included direct appeals from the agency. "The FBI has not forgotten and believes that during this critical moment in Iran's history, there is someone who knows something about her whereabouts," Daniel Wierzbicki said. He added: "The FBI wants to hear from you so you can help us apprehend Witt and bring her to justice." The bureau also specifically named monica elfriede witt in its public materials as it described her physical characteristics and current whereabouts.
Despite the indictment and public charges dating to 2019, Witt has not been arrested and remains at large. The reward underscores that the case — presented by authorities as a long-running national security matter involving alleged transfer of intelligence to Iran — remains active more than a decade after prosecutors say she defected. For now, Monica Elfriede Witt is a charged, unaccounted-for former intelligence specialist living in Iran, and the FBI has put $200,000 on the table to find her.
