(Facebook)
A 25-year-old federal contract worker in Augusta, Georgia has been charged by the Department of Justice for taking Top Secret materials from her workplace and mailing them to a news outlet.
Reality Leigh Winner was arrested by the F.B.I. on June 3 and appeared in federal court in Augusta on June 5. She was charged with gathering, transmitting or losing defense information that could have been damaging to the U.S. It’s alleged that she took a Top Secret document, copied it and mailed it to a news organization believed to be The Intercept, NBC News reported, though the organization was not named in the federal court documents.
The Intercept had published an intelligence document on June 5 —
the same day Winner appeared in court — that’s in line with what’s said in a criminal complaint. The NSA document was dated May 5. The Intercept’s report described details about Russian efforts to hack voting systems in the U.S. about one week before the 2016 presidential election. The document said that it “raises the possibility that Russian hacking may have breached at least some elements of the voting system, with disconcertingly uncertain results.”
To view photos of Winner posted to her social media accounts, click here.
Here’s what you need to know about Winner:
1. Winner Is a Former Member of the Military & Has Posted Anti-Trump Things on Social Media
(Instagram)
Winner was an employee at Pluribus International Corporation based out of Alexandria, Virginia. She was then assigned to a government agency in Georgia. She was employed at the facility since February 13, and held a Top Secret security clearance.
Pluribus is an analytical and engineering service that provides its services to federal, defense, security and the intelligence community. The company has 22 locations across the world, including three in the Republic of Korea. The one located in Georgia is in Fort Gordon.
Notably, Winner didn’t shy away from giving her take on politics. Just one day before the 2016 presidential election, she made a post to Facebook saying “on a positive note, This Tuesday when we become the United States of the Russian Federation, Olympic lifting will be the national sport.”
(Twitter)
(Twitter)
It also appeared as if Winner created a Twitter account under the handle “Sara Winners” to comment on a slew of political things, such as the North Dakota Pipeline and politics.
Her mother told The Daily Beast that Reality is “very passionate about her views.” But she said that she’s “never to my knowledge been active in politics or any of that.”
Prior to working for Pluribus, Winner was an active duty member of the U.S. Air Force. She was in the Air Force as a linguist, and speaks Pashto, Farsi and Dari, her mother Billie Winner-Davis told The Guardian’s Jon Swaine.
Candace Claiborne: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know
A State Department employee who is charged with lying to the FBI during a counterintelligence investigation.
2. A Search Warrant Said the F.B.I. Was Tipped off by a Podcast
(Instagram)
According to a search warrant obtained by Heavy, a special agent with the F.B.I. received information that Winner possessed and willfully sent classified information that was believed to result in damage to national security. The agency received the tip from the news outlet that received the document on May 30 saying that it may have received and classified information. The court document said that the reporting was dated by the NSA as May 5.
After launching an investigation, they found that Winner was one of six people who had access to the document in question on her computer. When investigating those six people, authorities found out that Winner had email contact with the news outlet on March 30 and then again March 31 from her personal GMail account.
In that email, Winner had asked for transcripts of a specific podcast, and a second email confirmed that she had subscribed to the podcast. She allegedly “printed, improperly removed and transmitted classified information from a defense agency of the U.S. government.”
After she printed the information, she mailed the document to the outlet, and the letter was postmarked with Augusta, Georgia, the criminal complaint said.
Read the full 21-page search warrant request below:
Reality Leigh Winner by Chris on Scribd
The search warrant was eventually granted, and authorities targeted her home and her vehicle, where they suspected that evidence of the alleged crime was.
Yacqub Khayre: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know
Yacqub Khayre has been identified as the man that took hostages and killed a man in an attack in Brighton, Australia.
3. Winner Admitted to Sharing the Classified Information to Authorities During an Interview
(Instagram)
According to the criminal complaint, the F.B.I. executed its search warrant on Winner’s home and vehicle and found evidence that she had shared the classified information with the news outlet.
Read the full 6-page criminal complaint in the document below:
Reality Leigh Winner by Chris on Scribd
Authorities arrested her June 3 at her home, and she was subsequently interviewed by investigators. Winner admitted to removing the classified intelligence reporting from her office in Georgia, copying it and mailing it to the news outlet. She allegedly told agents that she knew that she wasn’t allowed to share the intelligence reporting that she obtained, and she was aware that using the information for a news report could cause damage to the U.S. by a foreign nation.
Winner was then taken into federal custody, where she remains as she awaits trial.
Khuram Butt: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know
Khuram Butt was identified as one suspect in a gang of terrorists who staged coordinated terrorist attacks at London Bridge and Borough Market in England.
4. She Faces 10 Years in a Federal Prison
(Instagram)
Winner is presumed innocent until proven guilty, but faces 10 years in a federal prison if convicted of the charge.
The charge, “gathering, transmitting or losing defense information” is contained under Chapter 37 of federal law: espionage and censorship. The law went into effect as of February 1, 2010.
The prosecution of Winner is being handled by Julie A. Edelstein of the Department of Justice’s National Security Divisions Counterintelligence and Export Control Section, a news release by the agency said.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Jennifer Solari of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Georgia is also on the case.
David Dao: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know
A disgraced doctor and professional poker player from Kentucky has been identified as the United Airlines passenger forcibly pulled from a flight by police, leaving him bloodied.
5.She Is From Texas & Lived in Maryland
(Instagram)
Winner didn’t have a past criminal record, and her Facebook profile said that she was born in Kingsville, Texas.
The one thing she had on her record was one citation, issued December 13, 2016, in Howard, Maryland for failing to control her vehicle’s speed on a highway to avoid a collision. She reportedly went to H.M. King High School and lived in Columbia, Maryland at a time.
The last post on her Facebook on June 2 said: “You are what you love, not who loves you.”
Her mother told The Daily Beast that she became aware of the allegations June 4 when they spoke, but she wasn’t quite aware what they were.
“I don’t know who she might have sent it to,” she told the news outlet. “(DOJ) were very vague. They said she mishandled and released documents that she shouldn’t have, but we had no idea what it pertained to or who.”
One of the main thing on her daughter’s mind when she spoke with her was the condition of her dog and cat. She reportedly asked her mom to “help out with relocating” the pets.
Vladislav Surkov: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know
Reports say that President Donald Trump is expected to appoint someone to communicate directly with Vladimir Putin’s top aide, Vladislav Surkov.
Chris Bucher is a sports, politics and general news contributor to Heavy. A University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh graduate, Bucher spent time as the business editor at The Waukesha Freeman and was also the former sports assistant editor. You can follow him on Twitter @Buchage and reach him at chris.bucher@heavy.com.June 5, 2017 8:20 pm
powered by sue.ng a legal search engine