Heat
21-year-old Air National Guard member accused of leaking highly sensitive military documents was repeatedly warned about handling classified information, prosecutors allegedly Wednesday, as the Justice Department seeks to keep a defendant behind bars ahead of one of the most high-profile leak trials in recent history.
This photo illustration taken on April 13, 2023 shows the suspect, National Guardsman Jack … [+]
Key facts
Prosecutors have released Air Force memos detailing three separate instances since September in which defendant Jack Teixeira allegedly engaged in misconduct — including pocket notes he took on classified intelligence and using a computer to review intelligence unrelated to his duties at To the Massachusetts National Guard.
News of the warnings to Teixeira comes days before a judge will determine whether the accused leaker remains behind bars while awaiting trial.
Teixeira’s defense attorneys argued that he be released into his father’s custody, arguing that he was not a flight risk and that he never intended for the confidential documents he leaked on a private Discord server to become widely available.
DOJ earlier discussed that Teixeira “poses a serious flight risk,” given the mounting evidence against him and his potential prison sentence of up to 25 years — on Wednesday, the DOJ pointed to Teixeira’s previous warnings for mishandling classified information as evidence that he understood he was not allowed to share documents.
Key background
Teixeira was arrested in mid-April after he allegedly shared records about the war in Ukraine along with other classified information with a Discord group called Thug Shaker Central. Prosecutors allege Teixeira regularly shared redacted discussions of classified information with the group. The records did not stay within the instant messaging platform and ended up being shared on Russian-language Telegram channels and popular social media apps. At the beginning, The New York Times reported that Teixeira could be charged with violating the Espionage Act. Officials such as President Joe Biden and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky have indicated that the compromised information is a consequential loss. Some of the leaked documents contain candid assessments of Russian and Ukrainian troop strength and sensitive revelations about the behavior of US allies, although they do not appear to contain detailed war plans.
Tangent
And the previous one submission The Justice Department said Teixeira regularly made “racial threats” and was suspended from his high school in 2018 for comments about the use of Molotov cocktails.
Further reading
21-year-old aviator Jack Teixeira arrested for leaking documents in Ukraine (Forbes)
Teixeira’s classified paper tried to destroy evidence and should remain in prison, the DOJ claims (Forbes)
Forbes – Business