Rolando Sarraff Trujillo

Sarraff worked for the Cuban Directorate of Intelligence in Havana, where he reportedly acted as a double agent, providing secret information on Cuban agents operating in the United States to U.S. authorities. He was arrested by the Cuban authorities in November 1995, and sentenced to 25 years. He was released to the United States in a prisoner swap on December 18, 2014, coinciding with a thaw in diplomatic relations between the two countries.

In April 2014, Sarraff wrote an open letter from his Havana jail, which was published by the Cuban Human Rights Observatory. He referred to international media speculation about a possible exchange of U.S. citizen Philip Gross in Cuba for the remaining three members of the Cuban Five in the United States and urged a comprehensive exchange including all prisoners convicted for espionage in Cuba. He called for general support in preparing public opinion for such an exchange and suggested a focus on humanitarian considerations, especially with respect to those convicted spies—like himself and the three Cubans arrested in Miami in 1998—who had already spent more than 15 years in prison.

In 2014, a thaw in the relations between the United States and Cuba led to a swap of three Cuban spies (of the Cuban Five) in exchange for Alan Gross and an unnamed spy. Without identifying Sarraff, Obama said that the freed spy is "one of the most important intelligence agents that the United States has ever had in Cuba, and who has been imprisoned for nearly two decades".

On December 18, 2014, two of the New York Times Pulitzer Award-winning journalists, Mark Mazzetti and Michael S. Schmidt, collaborated on a front-page profile of Sarraff.

Former US Army counterintelligence officer Chris Simmons said that Sarraff was caught after his associate, Cohen, indiscreetly spent the large amount of money he received from the CIA. After noting he was under surveillance, Cohen signaled the CIA station in Havana for an "emergency extraction". Sarraff was supposed to be taken out of Cuba as well, but it was too late for him: he was arrested on 2 November 1995 and in September 1996, he was sentenced to 25 years in prison for passing state secrets to the US government. However, Cohen provided a different account to The Miami Herald, saying that he had fled Cuba on a raft, without CIA assistance.

Various commentators immediately noted that, as a DGI agent convicted for espionage in 1995, Sarraff was the only known prisoner matching the description. Following news reports about Sarraff's likely release, his family complained they had not heard from him and were left without any official information on his whereabouts. Almost four weeks after he had been moved from his last prison cell in Havana, Sarraff's sister Vilma informed media he had called her and let her know he was now in the United States, "free and doing fine".

From 1985 until 1990 Sarraff Trujillo attended the University of Havana, where he earned a degree in journalism before joining the Interior Ministry.

Rolando Sarraff Trujillo (born 22 August 1963) is a Cuban intelligence officer who was convicted for espionage for the United States Central Intelligence Agency.