Pedro Leonardo Mascheroni, an Argentina-born United States citizen and nuclear scientist has been sentenced to five years in prison after attempting to sell classified information and build nuclear weapons for Venezuela.

A former employee of Los Alamos National Laboratory, Mascheroni, 79, was caught in a sting operation, attempting to make a deal with federal agents disguised as Venezuelan officials. The proposed deal was for Mascheroni to design and supervise the construction of 40 nuclear weapons, one of which would be targeted on New York City.

According to the Associated Press, recordings of the attempted deal reveal that Mascheroni had not considered himself an American any longer, and that he boasted of becoming rich and powerful by selling secrets. According to The Guardian, Mascheroni claimed there would be no casualties from the bomb in New York, rather it would target the electrical grid, and giving weapons to oil rich Venezuela would secure the country against U.S. invasion.

His wife, and fellow former employee of Los Alamos Laboratory, Marjorie Roxby Mascheroni, 70, has also been convicted and sentenced to one year.  During their time the couple had access to restricted data and classified information which they attempted to sell. They were charged with, and convicted of “Conspiracy to communicate and communicating restricted data to an individual with intent to gain advantage for a foreign nation.”

Although Mascheroni attempted to sell secrets to what he thought was Venezuela, the FBI is not accusing Venezuela of any attempted espionage or of seeking classified, restricted, or sensitive information from the United States.

The five-year sentence is the result of a plea deal, though according to the federal prosecutor assigned to the case, Fred Federici, he still claims to have done nothing wrong, and was the victim of a trap. In a statement to a judge he stated that if the case had gone to trial he would not have been convicted.