A federal grand jury on Thursday indicted Air National Guardsman Jack Teixeira, who posted dozens of secret intelligence reports and other sensitive documents on a gaming server, on six counts of retaining and transmitting classified national defence information.
The filing of criminal charges against Mr Teixeira (21), comes two months after FBI agents arrested him at his home in North Dighton, Massachusetts, on April 13th.
Mr Teixeira has remained in federal custody after prosecutors presented evidence that he had a history of making violent and racist threats, had access to an arsenal of weapons and represented a risk of sharing sensitive information with foreign countries.
“The unauthorized removal, retention and transmission of classified information jeopardises our nation’s security,” Joshua S Levy, the acting U.S. attorney for Massachusetts, said in a statement. “Individuals granted access to classified materials have a fundamental duty to safeguard the information for the safety of the United States, our active service members, its citizens and its allies.”
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“We are committed to ensuring that those entrusted with sensitive national security information adhere to the law,” he added.
Mr Teixeira’s lawyer did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Before his arrest, Air Force officials caught Mr Teixeira taking notes and conducting deep-dive searches for classified material months before he was charged with leaking a vast trove of government secrets, but did not remove him from his job, according to previous filings in the case.
– This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
