Guardsman in Leaked Docs Case Allegedly Spoke of Violence, Feds Say He May Still Possess Secrets

Jack Teixeira, a 21-year-old Air National guardsman from Massachusetts, got into trouble when he leaked some extremely important military documents. The authorities investigating this case found that Jack had many guns and was talking about killing people in an online chat group. He was even talking about an “assassination van”. They will have a court hearing today to decide his punishment.

The court documents asked why Teixeira had access to important national secrets. The documents said he could still have info the public hasn’t seen, which could be so valuable that other countries would want him to live there and help him escape the US.

On Wednesday, the Air Force said it had to suspend two of its leaders who managed a special unit. They also could not access anything secret for now as part of an investigation. The unit was linked to a case where documents were leaked. A person involved in the case wanted to be part of the military at first but then changed his mind later on.

Court documents said that when Teixeira was in high school, people heard him talking about dangerous weapons and prejudice. Recently, he used his government computer to look up info about shootings and fights with the police. Due to this, online video game chats have become risky for the US military.

Prosecutors said that he is still a huge danger to the national safety and could possibly run away so they are still investigating if he kept any private information, including files that have not been released in public yet.

The prosecutors said that it is impossible to make sure that the Defendant won’t tell anyone else information he knows or has. They also said the Defendant has already caused a lot of trouble related to U.S. security, and he still can cause even more damage if he isn’t stopped. The Defendant has been in jail since his arrest a few weeks ago due to serious charges based on a secret leak of important information.

Teixeira has done something wrong with secret information and that’s why he has been charged under the Espionage Act. He hasn’t said if he is guilty yet. His lawyers want him to be released from prison, since they think restrictions can be placed on him even if he might run away – like him living at his dad’s place and having someone monitor him.

The defense said Teixeira doesn’t have access to any secret information anymore and they accuse prosecutors of believing that some foreign country might be able to get him to sneak away from the United States.

The government said that there’s no proof that Mr. Teixeira ever wanted to tell everyone about the private social media server. So, their argument that he will keep telling people what was on it or even destroying evidence if not stopped doesn’t make sense.

He is accused of sharing super secret documents about big national security issues on Discord, an app usually used by gamers to hang out. This caused surprise amongst military officials and made people around the world wonder if America can keep its secrets safe.

Prosecutors say that Teixeira had a lot of guns and would often talk on a platform (like the internet or social media) about hurting people. In February, he mentioned even building a minivan to attack people with.

The Justice Department reported that before joining the military, and even after he became part of it, this person was behaving in a way that wasn’t OK. This behavior put him in a situation where he had access to government secrets.

In 2018, Teixeira was suspended from school after another student heard him talk about weapons such as Molotov cocktails and guns. Because of this, the police were worried when he applied for a firearms identification card and they said “no”.

He kept trying for two years, and when he applied in 2020, he told the people that since he was part of the Guard, they could trust him to have a gun.

The Justice Department found out that last July, Teixeira used his government laptop to search for some past U.S shootings and police standoffs, such as “Ruby Ridge,” “Las Vegas shooting,” “Mandalay Bay shooting,” and “Buffalo tops shooting.” The Buffalo suppermarket mass shooting in 2022 was a hate crime.

If someone did a search on the government computer for mass shootings, then the computer should have sent this info to security. This could have led to people looking into Teixeira’s records and finding out more about them. The Air Force is investigating if that happened or not, and what security officers did with the information after.

Teixeira’s lawyers say that he had no criminal record and wouldn’t have been able to get guns if he was let out. They also said that what happened at his school was investigated by professionals properly, so after a few days, Teixeira was allowed to go back. This investigation has already been seen carefully by the Air National Guard before he joined them and when he got his top secret security clearance.

After some time had passed and stories started to get published about the document leak, Teixeira decided to try and get rid of the evidence. Police searched a garbage bin outside his home and found that he had broken a laptop, tablet and an Xbox gaming console.

The documents that have emerged reveal information about how the U.S., NATO and other nations are helping Ukraine, as well as their thoughts about their allies in the region. Some documents provide a closer look at what was happening in February and March, such as where both Ukraine and Russia were located on the battlefield, how many resources each side had, and what extra support was coming to Ukraine from its allies.

The reason why the person did this is still unknown. People who were in the group have shared that the person only wanted to show off, not to tell people about the things that are happening with the USA military or make a change in any policy.

In September 2019, Adam Teixeira joined the Air National Guard. Around December of that year, someone using a username connected to him posted what looked like secret information on Discord. This was discovered by investigators when they looked at records from Discord.

On April 6, the FBI found that Teixeira was looking for the word “leak” in a secure system. This showed that he was likely trying to locate information about who caused the leak. Tucker and Copp reported all this news from Washington.