Tennessee jury hangs on a Justice Department prosecution of a UT-Knoxville professor

From the Knoxville News-Sentinel, this update from the Department of Justice's China Initiative: 

The federal Justice Department's first prosecution in the nation under the Trump administration's "China Initiative" fizzled Wednesday when an East Tennessee jury deadlocked after two days of deliberation.

Now the Justice Department will have to decide whether to mount a second prosecution of former University of Tennessee at Knoxville associate professor Dr. Anming Hu, who was accused by the FBI of intentionally trying to defraud NASA by hiding his part-time work at the Beijing University of Technology.

The court did not make public how many of the jurors — four women and eight men, all white — refused to convict.

Defense attorney Phil Lomonaco called it a victory for Hu and his family.

Trial testimony has shown federal agents falsely accused Hu of spying for China based solely on a Google search. After he refused to work as a spy for the U.S. government, agents stalked and harassed him for more than two years, leading to the destruction of his reputation and internationally renowned career.

It will be interesting to see what the Biden Administration does with the China Initiative, especially in regards to the Charles Lieber case. Perhaps this was a case where the relevant FBI agent wasn't very convincing, and that's what the jury hung on.