Andrew Daulton Lee

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Andrew Daulton Lee (1952- ) a United States citizen and Los Angeles native, was portrayed by actor Sean Penn in director John Schlesinger's 1985 movie The Falcon and the Snowman based on the book by Robert Lindsey. The book and the film documented the true to life espionage activities of Lee (a heroin and cocaine dealer by trade, hence his nickname, "The Snowman") and his childhood friend Christopher Boyce during the mid-1970s. The Boyce character (nicknamed "The Falcon" because of his long interest in the sport of falconry) was played in the film by actor Timothy Hutton.

For nearly two years, Lee (the adopted eldest son of a wealthy physician) traveled to Mexico City operating as the courier for an espionage scheme which had consisted of his delivering to Soviet Embassy officials classified documents concerning how to decrypt secure US government message traffic and detailed specifications of the latest US spy satellites. These documents were supplied by Boyce, a code clerk employed with the large US defense contractor TRW, headquartered in the Los Angeles community of Redondo Beach. Boyce (whose father was an aerospace corporation security officer and a retired FBI agent) held a top secret clearance and worked in the company's "Black Vault" (classified communications center.)

In December 1976, Lee (with top secret microfilm on his person) was arrested by Mexican police in front of the Soviet Embassy on the false suspicion of having killed a Mexico City police officer, but under torture instead confessed to espionage, quickly implicating Boyce in the scheme. Lee was convicted of espionage and sentenced to life in prison at the federal penitentiary in Lompoc, California. He was released on parole in 1998. At some point after his release he was apparently hired by Sean Penn to be his personal assistant. [1]