Arlington Man, Former CIA Agent, Charged With Leaking Information

A former CIA officer was charged Monday with repeatedly leaking classified information to journalists -- including the name of an undercover officer and then-classified information regarding an operation to capture and question terror suspect Abu Zubaydah in 2002.

John Kiriakou, 47, of Arlington was a CIA intelligence officer from 1990 to 2004.

He is charged with one count of violating the Intelligence Identities Protection Act and two counts of violating the Espionage Act. He also was charged with one count of making false statements to the CIA's Publications Review Board, which the Justice Department described as an unsuccessful attempt to "trick" the CIA into letting him publish classified information in a book.

“Safeguarding classified information, including the identities of CIA officers involved in sensitive operations, is critical to keeping our intelligence officers safe and protecting our national security,” Attorney General Eric Holder stated in a news release.

“Today’s charges reinforce the Justice Department’s commitment to hold accountable anyone who would violate the solemn duty not to disclose such sensitive information.”

The charges constitute the sixth case of criminal prosecution for leaked information since President Barack Obama was elected, according to Politico.

The book cited by the Justice Department -- "The Reluctant Spy: My Secret Life in the CIA's War on Terror" -- was eventually published, and Kiriakou has since written numerous op-eds for newspapers around the world and blog entries for the Huffington Post.

He is is an intelligence and counterterrorism consultant for ABC News and a former senior investigator for the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, focusing on the Middle East, South Asia and international terrorism, according to his Huffington Post bio.

The criminal complaint, filed today in federal court in Alexandria, specifically names Kiriakou as a source in a June 2008 front-page New York Times story called "Inside a 9/11 Mastermind's Interrogation." A Times spokesman would not discuss the allegations.

Kiriakou has told reporters that the interrogation of Zubaydah, who is being held at Guantanamo Bay, included the controversial technique called waterboarding, according to MSNBC.

Kiriakou made his initial court appearance today before federal Magistrate Judge John F. Anderson in Alexandria. He has retained Plato Cacheris as his defense attorney.

The defense waived the preliminary hearing, and the court found probable cause for the arrest, a Justice Department spokesman stated in an email to Patch.

Kiriakou was released and his wife was named as a third-party custodian, according to that email. Kiriakou, his wife and his brother were ordered to sign a $250,000 unsecured bond, and Kiriakou was forced to surrender his passport and limit his travel to the Washington, D.C., metro area.

He was also told to have no contact with potential witnesses and to surrender any weapons, according to the Justice Department.

The matter was referred to the grand jury for further action, according to the Justice Department.

If convicted, Kiriakou faces up to five years in prison -- to be imposed consecutively with any other prison term -- for disclosing the identity of a covert officer, up to 10 years in prison for each violation of the Espionage Act and up to five years for making false statements.

Each count carries up to a $250,000 fine.