A young Chinese scientist interrogated for hours after an international flight to Detroit and held in jail for three months was sentenced to time served Wednesday for illegally shipping biological material to the U.S. that nonetheless wasn't a threat to the public.

Associated Press reporter Ed White covered the sentencing hearing for Chengxuan Han, who was headed to a one-year job at a University of Michigan lab.

According to White, a U.S. District Court judge acknowledged that federal agents have a critical role in stopping bad actors from trying to get dangerous material into the country. But he also noted that Han doesn't appear to fit that category.

Han cried as she spoke to the judge in Mandarin and expressed regret, White said.

“I'm happy that Ms. Han gets to go home,” defense attorney Sara Garber told reporters outside the federal courthouse downtown.

Han is in her late 20s. She pleaded no contest to smuggling and making false statements. Before her arrival in the U.S., authorities said she made three shipments to someone in Ann Arbor, Michigan, including a book with a hidden envelope that contained filter paper with 28 shapes containing plasmids, which are found naturally in bacteria. Han also was accused of sending petri dishes that contained nematode worms, known as C. Elegans. Authorities said the packages were not properly labeled and that Han didn't have approval to ship them.

Han's case is one of two involving Chinese scientists and the University of Michigan. Yunqing Jian is charged with conspiring with her boyfriend, another scientist from China, to bring a toxic fungus into the U.S.

“The government will contend that the material that she was sending into the U.S. had the potential to be quite harmful,” White said.

Jian’s case is pending.