MA Guardsman Accused In Docs Leak Had Been Warned By Superiors: Report

DIGHTON, MA —Jack Douglas Teixeira, the 21-year-old Massachusetts Air National Guardsman suspected of leaking classified intelligence documents that appeared online in the first part of the year, had been caught twice taking notes about classified documents and had also been seen accessing information that was not relevant to his job, lawyers said in Justice Department documents obtained by NBC News.

Court filings show that Teixeira was repeatedly warned by superiors about his handling of such classified information, yet his access was not restricted, according to the outlet.

Teixeira made his first court appearance in Boston April 13 after his arrest at his mother's North Dighton house the previous day. He is charged with unauthorized retention and transmission of national defense information, which carries a maximum prison time of 10 years, and unauthorized willful retention and removal of classified documents, which carries a maximum of 5 years, according to prosecutors.

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Prosecutors requested that Jack Teixeira remain detained prior to his trial as he "poses a serious flight risk" and may still be keeping information for hostile nations that could "offer him safe harbor and attempt to facilitate his escape from the United States," according to court documents released in April.

The judge has not yet ruled on whether Teixeira can be held without bond before his trial but declined to immediately free him from custody. A second hearing has been set for Friday, according to NBC News.

Teixeira is accused of leading a gaming chat group made up of around 20 or 30 young men and teenagers, in which, according to NBC News, he distributed the leaked documents revealing details of the U.S. spying on Russia’s war efforts in Ukraine, secret assessments of Ukraine’s combat power, and intelligence gathering on America’s allies.

Prosecutors said that the publication of "top secret" information, by definition, "reasonably could be expected to cause serious damage to the national security" of the United States. Other topics of discussion apparently included guns, racist memes, and video games.

An 18-page court filing obtained by Patch details Teixeira's apparent history of violent musings. Prosecutors said that Teixeira was suspended from his high school in 2018 when a classmate overheard him make remarks about weapons, including Molotov cocktails, guns at the school, and racial threats, which Teixeira later told officials were references to a video game.

Prosecutors also allege that Teixeira kept an arsenal of weapons in his bedroom at his primary residence with his mother and stepfather in North Dighton. He also made regular comments about violence and murder on social media, including musings about his wish to “kill a [expletive] ton of people” because it would be “culling the weak-minded" and make a minivan into an "assassination van," prosecutors said.

Teixeira's defense team has argued there is no allegation he ever intended for documents to be distributed widely.