"Traitor" is defined in the law as one who commits treason. Treason entails aiding an enemy of the United States. For example, Black's Law Dictionary (7th ed. 1999) gives the primary definition of "traitor" as "A person who commits treason against his or her country."

That same legal dictionary defines "treason" as "The offense of attempting to overthrow the government of the state to which one owes allegiance, either by making war against the state or by materially supporting its enemies."

2005 - Status: Pending

HINZMAN, Jeremy

In January 2004, Hinzman, 26, fled to Canada in search of asylum just days before his airborne division unit was deployed to Iraq to fight in a war he considered illegal under international law, one in which he feared he would be forced to commit atrocities, he says.

His refugee claim was rejected in March 2005 by the Immigration and Refugee Board, and now Hinzman, who has filed a Federal Court challenge to the ruling in hopes of staving off deportation, faces a court martial in the U.S. and up to five years in jail.

Current status: Under Deportation Order awaiting his appeal in Federal Court in Canada.

The Following Military Personnel have desereted their units in the United States and are attempting to claim refugee status in Canada.

David Bunt
Diedra Cobb
Dan Felushko
Stephen Funk
Abdul Henderson
Brandon Hughey
Ghanim Khalil
Jimmy Massey
Charmaine Means
David Sanders
Michael Sudbury
Wilfredo Torres
Carl Webb
Abdulla Webster

February 10, 2005 - Status: Convicted, Sentencing Pending

STEWART, Lynne F.

Lynne F. Stewart, an outspoken lawyer known for representing a long list of unpopular defendants, was convicted by a federal jury in Manhattan of aiding Islamic terrorism by smuggling messages out of jail from a terrorist client. In a startlingly sweeping verdict, Ms. Stewart was convicted on all five counts of providing material aid to terrorism and of lying to the government when she pledged to obey federal rules that barred her client, Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, from communicating with his followers.

She faces up to 30 years in prison

October 4, 2002 - Sentenced: 20 years without parole.

LINDH, John Philip Walker

John Phillip Walker Lindh (born February 9 1981, is an American (United States citizen ) who was captured in Afganistan during while fighting for the Taliban in 2001. His capture made worldwide headlines, and the media dubbed him the "American Taliban."

Upon capture, Walker signed confession documents while he was held by the United States Marine Corps on USS Peleliu and informed his interrogators that he was not merely Taliban but al-Qaeda. John Ashcroft , on January 16 , 2002, announced that Lindh would be tried in the United States.

Walker was offered a plea bargan which he accepted. On July 15, 2002, he entered his plea of guilty to the two remaining charges. The judge asked Walker to say, in his own words, what he was admitting to. "I plead guilty," he said. "I provided my services as a soldier to the Taliban last year from about August to December. In the course of doing so, I carried a rifle and two grenades. I did so knowingly and willingly knowing that it was illegal." On October 4 , 2002, Judge T.S. Ellis formally imposed the sentence: 20 years without parole.

May 10, 2000 - Sentenced: Life Imprisonment without parole.

HANSSEN, Robert

May 10, 2002 former FBI agent Robert Hanssen was sentenced Friday to life in prison without parole for spying for the Soviet Union and Russia.

Hanssen pleaded guilty to 15 counts of espionage and conspiracy for passing classified information to the Soviet Union and, later, Russia, during a 20-year period.

Hanssens reasons are complex, some reasons proffered were monetary and also involved the defendant's ego. Hanssen sold the U.S. secrets to Moscow for $1.4 million in cash and diamonds.

June 23, 1997 - Sentenced: 27 years.

PITTS, Earl Edwin

Pitts, a senior FBI agent, was arrested on 18 December 1996 at the FBI Academy in Quantico, Virginia, and charged with providing classified information to the Russian intelligence services from 1987 until 1992. He is believed to have received $224,000 from Russian intelligence services for his activities.

Earl Edwin Pitts pleaded guilty to two counts of espionage in February 1997 following the discovery of a computer disk with a letter to his supposed Russian handler. On 23 June, he was sentenced to 27 years in prison by a Federal judge who stated that the former agent was guilty of "the most egregious abuse of trust." When asked why he spied, Pitts cited a number of grievances he had against the FBI and stated that he "wanted to pay them back."

April 28, 1994 - Sentenced: Life Imprisonment without parole.

AMES, Aldrich Hazen

Aldrich Hazen Ames was arrested by the FBI in Arlington, Virginia on espionage charges on February 24, 1994. At the time of his arrest, Ames was a 31-year veteran of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), who had been spying for the Russians since 1985. Arrested with him was his wife, Rosario Ames, who had aided and abetted his espionage activities.

Following guilty pleas by both Ames and his wife on April 28, 1994, Ames was sentenced to incarceration for life without the possibility of parole. Rosario Ames was sentenced on October 20, 1994 to 63 months in prison.

1987 - Sentenced: Life Imprisonment.

POLLARD, Johnathan

In November 1985, the FBI arrested Jonathan Pollard, a U.S. Navy intelligence analyst, on charges of selling classified material to Israel. Pollard was subsequently sentenced to life imprisonment. His wife, Anne, got five years in jail for assisting her husband.

Pollard caused enormous damage to U.S. national security. He gave Israel top-secret U.S. military intelligence and diplomatic codes; names of nearly 100 U.S. agents in the Mideast, who were then "turned" by Israel; NSA code-breaking techniques and targets; intercepts of foreign communications; and U.S. war-fighting plans for the Middleast.

According to CIA sources, Pollard provided Israeli intelligence with names of important American agents inside the former Soviet Union and Russia who had supplied information on East Bloc weapons and war plans. How the agents' names were linked to the secrets they supplied - a major breach of basic intelligence security - remains a mystery. Some of the enormously sensitive secrets stolen by Pollard may have been either sold, or bartered, by Israel to the Soviet Union.

Pollard is no Jewish patriot. He is a traitor who sold out his country, and fellow intelligence officers, for money, then claimed he was being persecuted by anti-Semites.

He pleaded guilty to espionage on June 4, and in 1987, Pollard was sentenced to life in prison.