Arizona man sentenced in Iranian arms-dealing sting

An Arizona electronics dealer who believed he was selling microwave radios to Iran was sentenced Wednesday to six months of home confinement by a federal judge in Wilmington - a more lenient term than requested by either the prosecution or the defense.

Vikramaditya Singh, whose wife's family is politically prominent in India, was targeted by undercover U.S. Homeland Security agents in Philadelphia as a follow-up to a sting involving Iranian arms broker Amir Ardebili.

The undercover agents, who arrested Ardebili in October 2007 in Tbilisi, Georgia, used data from the Iranian's laptop to investigate hundreds of brokers in America.

Before he was arrested, Ardebili and Singh had been discussing a potential six-figure deal, prosecutors said, but there is no evidence that they completed it. After Ardebili's arrest, prosecutors said, Singh sold undercover agents two military-grade radios, knowing they were destined for Iran, and made plans to buy 40 more. Those negotiations took place over 20 months and concluded with shipments to Europe and a meeting at Singh's office in Arizona.

Singh, 34, moved to the United States in 1998 and lives in Fountain Hills, Ariz. He is the brother-in-law of Jayant Chaudhary, a member of India's parliament, and managed his 2008 campaign. According to Indian media, Singh's wife's father is Ajit Singh, leader of the Rashtriya Lok Dal party, and her grandfather is Chaudhary Charan Singh, who was prime minister of India in 1979 and 1980.

Singh's lawyer, Danny C. Onorato, sought a one-year term and asked U.S. District Judge Gregory M. Sleet to consider his client's otherwise exemplary life and the fact that others who had committed similar crimes had received sentences of less than a year.

"Mr. Singh understands that his reasoning was legally flawed and morally wrong," Onorato said, "and he feels immeasurable remorse."

Assistant U.S. Attorney Robert F. Kravetz had sought a sentence of 18 months. He said Singh's conduct was "not merely careless or a product of poor judgment but knowingly unlawful," in part because Singh knew from his business dealings that the radios involved were also deployed on U.S. military bases.

Sleet sentenced Singh to six months of home confinement, three years' probation, and a $100,000 fine. The sentence means Singh is likely to be deported this year.

The Ardebili investigation, known as Operation Shakespeare and pursued by undercover Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, was the focus of an eight-part Inquirer series last year. Ardebili was extradited to the United States and is serving a five-year sentence.

A document filed in the Singh case Monday reveals that Ardebili's business partner, believed to be living in Shiraz, Iran, has been indicted, though details of that case, including the correct spelling of the partner's name, remain sealed.

Ardebili and the partner had a falling out in 2007, but in 2005 and 2006 had purchased more than $1 million worth of high-tech American-made gear for the Iranian military, U.S. officials said.