Pentagon leaker Jack Teixeira sentenced to 15 years in prison for violating Espionage Act

Boston — Former Massachusetts Air National Guardsman Jack Teixeira, who admitted he illegally posted sensitive military information to online chat rooms in what prosecutors called one of the “most prolific” and “rare” government leak operations, was sentenced to 15 years in prison by a Boston federal judge on Tuesday. 

Teixeira, a 22-year-old Massachusetts native, pleaded guilty in March to six counts of violating the Espionage Act, acknowledging he was behind the yearlong distribution of dozens of classified government documents — including some marked “top secret” — on Discord, a social media platform. The classified documents involved in the leak touched on a number of sensitive issues, but the most notable were about Russia’s war in Ukraine, detailed troop movements and timelines for Western weapons deliveries to the war-torn country, investigators said. 

Judge Indira Talwani, who imposed the sentence, formally accepted the plea agreement on Tuesday and told Teixeira, “You posted on the internet on Discord hundreds of documents over a period of a year…I don’t find any ambiguity here as to what you were doing being wrong.” 

Federal law enforcement arrested Teixeira at his family’s Massachusetts home after a weekslong probe into how sensitive Pentagon records were ending up online.

Prosecutors asked Talwani to sentence the defendant to 200 months in prison — almost 17 years — for his central role in “one of the most significant and consequential violations of the Espionage Act in American history,” one that has prompted reforms in the handling of classified information. 

“The harm the defendant caused to the national security from his disclosures of national defense information is extraordinary,” prosecutors wrote in an October court filing. In court on Tuesday, government attorneys reiterated their stance, arguing, “The damage he caused is historic.” 

“The defendant’s actions directly aided our adversaries and damaged our alliances,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Jared Dolan said. “Jack Teixeira… will be a cautionary tale for the men and women of the United States military…They are going to be told ‘This is what happens if you break your promises. This is what happens if you break your oath.'” 

Wearing an orange prison uniform, Teixeira, whose family was seated in the courtroom gallery behind him, asked the judge for leniency and expressed remorse. 

“I’m sorry for all of the harm that I’ve brought and I’ve caused,” he said Tuesday. “I understand that all of the responsibility and consequences falls upon my shoulders alone.”

For over a year, investigators said Teixeira, who had top secret security clearance as an IT worker at the Otis Air National Guard Base, accessed the classified documents illegally and either hand-copied the information or printed the records before posting the data in the Discord chat rooms. He even messaged individuals in his forums and offered to find specific information about “happenings that pertain to your country,” court records said. 

The national defense information began appearing online in February 2022, but investigators didn’t link the leaks to Teixeira for over a year. Prosecutors alleged Teixeira knew his conduct was illegal and accused him of violating his oath to serve. 

As the investigation into the leaks zeroed in on Teixeira’s unit, prosecutors alleged in previous court documents that Teixeira began instructing others in the Discord group to “delete all messages.” 

“[i]f anyone comes looking, don’t tell them sh**,” he allegedly wrote to one user. And he told another, “Try to delete all my messages in civil discussions.” 

“In the aggregate, the defendant’s criminal conduct over the course of more than a year ‘critically and negatively impacted’ the Department of Defense’s mission, endangered his fellow soldiers, other citizens, and allied governments throughout the world,” prosecutors argued last month, urging the judge to impose a heavy sentence. 

Teixeira’s defense attorney, however, asked for a sentence of 11 years in prison, telling the judge in court filings, “His intent was never to harm the United States,” but to “educate his friends about world events to make certain they were not misled by misinformation.” 

“That makes no sense, with all due respect,” the judge shot back in court on Tuesday when Teixeira’s defense attorney repeated that point and said his client had an “obsessive need to tell the truth.” 

“What you have convinced me of is he had an obsessive need to talk,” the judge retorted. “I see why you’re saying he wasn’t trying to harm the government.” 

Revealing that Teixeira was diagnosed with autism, his lawyer wrote in an October court filing that “his motives and decisions were naïve, not nefarious.” Teixeira accepted responsibility for the admitted crimes, including by participating in an hourslong briefing with members of the intelligence community, the defense filings argued.

“The actions of Jack Teixeira are inexcusable,” the attorney wrote, describing his client not as a criminal leaker but as a misguided young person swept up in an online ecosystem. “However, Jack is still essentially a child – at the very least, a ‘youthful offender’ – who has his whole life in front of him.” 

Prosecutors disagreed with this characterization, telling the judge his age should not affect the sentence. “Our military is built on the backbone of people his age and younger,” Dolan said, arguing that Teixeira accepted responsibility to defend the nation. “This was not based on impulse. If it was, it was an impulsive decision that he made every single day that he went to work for a year,” the prosecutor added. 

But Teixeira’s attorney, Michael Bachrach, pushed back in court, pointing out the 11 years in prison he requested amounted to about half Teixeira’s life. 

“It does seem that your autism has affected your ability to make friendships and to understand other people’s hurts perhaps,” the judge told Teixeira. “It isn’t that that’s something that explains what you did. I think it is something that you need to think about how you’re going to avoid anything like this going forward.” 

Following Teixeira’s arrest, the Air Force inspector general found that individuals in his Massachusetts unit failed to take proper action after at least four separate security incidents. Members of his unit “enabled” the leaks by not properly supervising his access to classified information, the review concluded. The Air National Guard took action against 15 individuals for “dereliction in the performance of duties” as a result of the report’s findings. 

Texeira also faces charges of disobeying orders and obstructing justice in a military court martial, which are expected to be adjudicated in March. 

contributed to this report.