Alleged Pentagon Leaker Charged Under Espionage Act In Boston Court
The alleged leaker of hundreds of classified Pentagon and US intelligence documents, 21-year old Jack Teixeira, was charged Friday with violating the Espionage Act. An additional statute was also cited which prohibits unauthorized removal of classified documents.
Both violations could bring 15 or 20 years in prison if convicted, after the Pentagon deemed his actions as posing a "very serious" national security risk. The documents were a mix of classifications: everything from sensitive but unclassified, to Secret, to 'Top Secret/NOFORN' - meaning foreign allies were not allowed access to these. Espioange Act charges typically carry up to 10 years in prison each.
Teixeira appeared in a federal court on Friday in Boston, after a somewhat dramatic FBI raid and arrest outside a residence in North Dighton, Massachusetts the day prior.
One question which has been commonly asked is how such a young, relatively low ranking national guardsman was able to access so many classified and even Top Secret material... His specialty was military intelligence and specifically he worked in communications systems related to classified DoD networks:
Mr Teixeira, who made his first appearance in court on Friday in Boston, is a member of the intelligence wing of the Massachusetts Air National Guard. The charge sheet says he was given top-secret security clearance in 2021 and since February this year had the title of "Cyber Defense Operations Journeyman".
And concerning the systems he worked on: "Though a low-ranking member of the military, he served in the 102nd Intelligence Wing of the Massachusetts Air National Guard, a position that came with a top secret security clearance and access to the Pentagon’s Joint Worldwide Intelligence Communications System," The Hill describes.
Here's a review of what became known in the lead-up to his Teixeira's arrest, according to Axios:
- A man known as "OG" initially began sharing the documents with roughly two dozen acquaintances — mostly men and boys — in a private chat room called "Thug Shaker Central" on the gamer-friendly platform Discord, the Washington Post reported earlier this week.
- Teixeira, who was later identified as the suspected leaker, spent years posting about memes, guns and games on the platform, per AP.
- He saw himself as an unofficial leader of the group and wanted to impress other members and teach them "about actual war," members told the New York Times.
- The poster, who used several online handles including "jackthedripper" and "excalibureffect," uploaded images of the documents to the Discord server, the Washington Post reported, citing people familiar with the case.
- Members of the Discord group also showed the Post video of Teixeira "shouting racist and antisemitic slurs before firing a rifle."
He had been surveilled by the FBI for some length of time prior to the feds moving in to make the arrest.
It should be recalled that only a week ago anonymous US officials were saying Russian intelligence was the source of the leak. That story has been quickly memory-holed.
I can barely put into words how dangerous and twisted it is that it is now the NYT and WashPost that does the FBI's job for it by hunting down leakers of classified information -- the people on whom real journalism depends -- working in tandem with state-funded Bellingcat: https://t.co/v2VIq2lSYI
— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) April 14, 2023
Meanwhile, some interesting alternative theories have emerged regarding the timing and "the why" of the leaks.
