A federal judge sentenced a Massachusetts Air National Guardsman on Tuesday to 15 years in prison for posting secret intelligence reports online.
In court documents, the government has described the airman, Jack Teixeira, as among the most “prolific leakers” of classified information about national defense secrets in the country’s history.
“You are young and you have a future ahead of you, but it is such a serious crime,” the judge, Indira Talwani of Federal District Court in Massachusetts, told Airman Teixeira, 22, on Tuesday.
The government recommended a sentence of just under 17 years in prison. Airman Teixeira’s lawyer on Tuesday argued that his sentence should instead be 11 years.
The sentencing brings to an end a case that raised questions over how easily a relatively low-level member of the guard had obtained a top-secret clearance that gave him access to some of the country’s most sensitive secrets.
“I’m sorry for all the harm that I’ve wrought and that I’ve caused,” Airman Teixeira said. “I understand all the responsibility and consequences falls on my shoulders alone. And I accept whatever that may bring.”
Airman Teixeira, who served as an information technology specialist at an air base on Cape Cod, shared the classified material that he had obtained on the social media platform Discord. At one point, he acknowledged he had disclosed material that “I’m not supposed to.”
In the courtroom on Tuesday, an assistant U.S. attorney, Jason C. Dolan, said a sentence of nearly 17 years was appropriate.
“His conduct and his offenses are unparalleled in breadth, in depth, and in quality of the information,” Mr. Dolan said.
Among the airman’s disclosures was top secret information about another country’s plans to target American service members in the United States and internationally.
Airman Teixeira also shared details about supplying equipment to Ukraine, including how it would be transported and used. He posted a report on Russian and Ukrainian troop movements that U.S. officials said might have compromised how America gathers intelligence.
Shortly before his arrest, a friend told him that some of the disclosures were being shared on a pro-Russian Telegram channel, according to documents. Airman Teixeira then asked his contact to delete his messages.
Airman Teixeira was arrested at his mother’s house in North Dighton, Mass., in April 2023. He has been held without bail since.
Prosecutors have said that they found no evidence that Airman Teixeira was engaged in espionage. Instead, he posted the information to feed his ego and impress anonymous friends. “The amount of damage he caused is immeasurable,” they wrote in a court filing.
They compared Airman Teixeira’s case to the case against a former C.I.A. computer engineer who stole classified information and shared it with WikiLeaks. Earlier this year, he was sentenced to 40 years in prison.
After initially pleading not guilty, Airman Teixeira pleaded guilty to six counts of “willful retention and transmission of national defense information” under the Espionage Act, according to court documents.
His family blamed a “lackadaisical work atmosphere” on his ability to retrieve and post some of the government’s most closely held secrets. His defense also argued that an expert diagnosed him with a type of autism. But that did not sway the prosecution.
“The defendant understood what he was doing was wrong. He had the ability to make a different choice,” Mr. Dolan said on Tuesday.
He is set to face a military court-martial in the spring, which could determine whether he remains a member of the National Guard.
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