- Alleged leaker Jack Teixeira searched his government computer for "leak," prosecutors say.
- Teixeira was arrested Thursday in connection with the top secret military document leak.
BOSTON, MA — The alleged leaker of a trove of top secret documents, Jack Teixeira, appeared in court Friday, at which time a criminal complaint was unsealed to reveal he searched his government computer for "leak" to see if investigators were onto him, prosecutors say.
According to the criminal complaint, Teixeira, 21, completed the search on classified networks on April 6. Prosecutors allege Teixeira was likely searching the term in order to see if investigators had leads on the identity of the leaker.
Teixeira, a Massachusetts Air National Guard member, was arrested Thursday, a day after federal authorities identified him, in connection with the leak of top secret military documents of varying sensitivity about the Ukraine war and other national security issues.
According to the criminal complaint, Teixeira is facing the possibility of over a decade in prison, as he has been charged with unauthorized retention and transmission of national defense information and unauthorized removal and retention of classified documents or material.
Teixeira's hearing at a federal courthouse in Boston on Friday morning was brief. He was not released on bail and will return to court on Wednesday. As members of Teixeira's family were seen leaving the building, they were mobbed by a press gaggle, but they did not answer any questions about Teixeira or the charges against him.
The collection of highly sensitive military intelligence documents prosecutors allege Texeira was involved in leaking recently circulated around various social media platforms and became the focus of a federal investigation after their existence began making headlines. The documents contain secret information about US allies, like Israel, Egypt, and South Korea, as well as adversaries, like North Korea, China, and Russia.
Dozens of documents contained information about Russia's ongoing war in Ukraine and included details about force attrition, battlefield casualties, weapons and military hardware, and Kyiv's battlefield readiness and preparations.
US officials scrambled to investigate how the documents were leaked online. The unauthorized disclosure set off alarm bells in Washington and in the capital cities of its partner countries. Some governments strongly pushed back against the claims made about their respective domestic affairs that were included in some of the documents.
The FBI got it's first lead on Teixeira on April 10, and then had his identity and address nailed down by Wednesday. On Thursday, federal agents arrested Teixeira at his home in southeastern Massachusetts.
According to the criminal complaint, the purpose of the online gaming server — where Teixeira allegedly first started leaking the documents, was to discuss international affairs and war. Photographs of classified documents began showing up online in January, though he first started leaking classified information in other forms much earlier to followers in the chat group, which also featured discussions of guns, God, and racist memes.
"Certain of the images appear to depict Government Information that was used to inform senior military and civilian government officials during briefings at the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia," the criminal complaint reads.
Teixeira enlisted in the Air National Guard in September 2019, and was stationed at Otis Air National Guard Base in Massachusetts. In 2021, he was given "Top Secret" security clearance, according to the criminal complaint. That clearance would have given him access to the classified documents leaked online.