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Robert Hanssen

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Accused FBI spy Robert Hanssen will enter a guilty plea to espionage charges at a hearing set for Friday under a plea agreement with federal prosecutors, an attorney for Hanssen said Tuesday.

Details of the agreement will remain under seal until the hearing. But a government source said Hanssen will plead guilty in return for a life sentence. The 25-year former FBI agent could have faced the death penalty for allegedly spying for Moscow since 1985.

Hanssen, a counterintelligence expert, was arrested in February at a Virginia park minutes after he allegedly left a package under a wooden footbridge. Investigators say the bridge was a drop site for delivering documents to his Russian handlers.

He has been indicted on 21 espionage-related charges, 14 of which carry a possible death sentence.

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The indictment alleges that Hanssen took $1.4 million in cash and diamonds in return for passing along U.S. secrets to Moscow. Those secrets included the identities of U.S. spies, highly classified eavesdropping technology and nuclear war plans, according to the indictment.

Prosecutors have described the damage to national security allegedly caused by Hanssen's spying as extremely grave. During plea negotiations, prosecutors had been seeking Hanssen's full cooperation in assessing the damage as a condition for sparing him from the death penalty.

VIDEO Ex-FBI agent Robert Hanssen is expected to plead guilty to espionage charges to avoid a death sentence. CNN's Kelli Arena reports (July 3) Play video (QuickTime, Real or Windows Media)   MORE STORIES Indictment (US v. Hanssen)   Part I  (FindLaw) (PDF) Part 2  (FindLaw) (PDF) Criminal Complaint  (FindLaw) (PDF) Affidavit in support of Complaint and Warrants  (FindLaw) (PDF) Documents in PDF format require Adobe Acrobat Reader  for viewing.

CIA Director George Tenet favored keeping Hanssen alive, while Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld favored the death penalty, sources said.

Plea talks resumed in early June after breaking down in April. At the time, Hanssen's lawyers blamed the stalemate on the government's unwillingness to remove the death penalty from the negotiating table.

Sources close to the investigation say Hanssen's wife, Bonnie, told investigators that her husband confessed to her in 1979 that he was passing information to the Soviets, claiming it was part of an effort to trick them. She said he promised to stop spying and, at the urging of a priest, donated the money he allegedly received to charity, sources said.

Law enforcement officials said they have no reason to believe Bonnie Hanssen hasn't been truthful and there are no plans to charge her with any crime. Whether she will be able to collect her husband's FBI pension has been an issue in the plea negotiations.

-- CNN Justice Correspondent Kelli Arena contributed to this report.