Howard Phillips, from Harlow, intended to help two apparent Russian agents called ‘Sasha’ and ‘Dima’, including by passing on personal information about former defence secretary Sir Grant Shapps.
But they were undercover British intelligence officers and a jury found Phillips guilty of assisting a foreign intelligence service.
Sentencing him at Winchester Crown Court, judge Mrs Justice Cheema-Grubb told him: “You were prepared to betray your country for money.
“You took a grave risk and didn’t care what damage you caused. Through the deliberate work of the security services you were caught before providing material assistance to a foreign intelligence service so the danger was averted.”
The judge said that Phillips had “a personality with narcissistic tendencies”.
She said: “He is an intelligent man with a distorted concept of his own significance and was unwilling to own up in public that he was prepared to behave in a dishonourable and treacherous way.”
She added: “He clearly kept up with current affairs and he would have been informed of the extreme actions Russia is prepared to undertake against its targets.”
The trial was told that Phillips intended to assist Russian agents from the end of 2023 until May last year.
Phillips offered to pass on Sir Grant’s contact details as well as the location where he kept his private plane in order to “facilitate the Russians in listening on British defence plans”, the trial heard.
In a victim impact statement read to the court, Sir Grant, who was defence secretary at the time, said that he was “shocked” when he was briefed on Phillips’ activities and concerned for the safety of his family.
Sir Grant said that he recalled going to dinner at the home of Phillips when he moved to the area in 2002 and added: “I feel it has been a complete breach of trust”.
Jocelyn Ledward KC, prosecuting, said that Phillips had been motivated by money to offer a “concierge service” to the UK agents who were “roleplaying” as Russian agents and the court heard he offered his “100% loyalty and dedication”.
She said: “He had lived well beyond his means for some time and he had made no provision for his retirement and was reliant on the generosity of others, even for housing.”
Ms Ledward added: “He accepted he did all that in the knowledge of the type of activity carried out by the agents of the Russian intelligence service on UK soil in the past, including assassination and attempted assassination.”
Jeremy Dein KC, defending, said his client had made a “monumental error of judgment” and had acted to boost his own ego after his life had “collapsed”.
He described Phillips as “eccentric”, “zany” and a “fantasist” before adding that he was “proudly British, pro-western, proudly Jewish”.
He said: “He was a fantasist, he believed he could manage Arsenal football club or even England.”
He added: “This was an ageing man whose life had collapsed, who was clearly not thinking straight and was desperate for money.
“He had been living in his car at one stage and everything was out of sync with the hard-wording and dedicated life he had lived.
“There is nothing to suggest that, thinking straight, Mr Phillips would have wanted to undermine the United Kingdom.”
The defendant’s ex-wife, Amanda Phillips, told the court that he “would dream about being like James Bond”, and that he watched films to do with MI5 and MI6 as he was “infatuated with it”.
Phillips previously claimed he had contacted the Russian embassy in early 2024 in a bid to track and expose Russian agents to assist Israel.
He told jurors he ascertained “from the onset” that ‘Dima’ and ‘Shasha’ were “definitely not Russian”, but that he carried on “playing a role” around these agents to “test the waters”.
