The Espionage Act consists of more than half a dozen provisions, each laying out different circumstances where a violation may occur. “Career federal prosecutors are serious people, and that’s a serious inquiry that they would take before they decide whether they want to pursue charges against anyone, whether it’s a politician or an individual citizen,” Gleeson said. attorney wants to indict in most cases, but the government needs to consider if it can prove its case beyond a reasonable doubt. He said grand juries usually issue indictments for who a U.S. He said probable cause, needed to obtain a search warrant, is a different standard than beyond a reasonable doubt, needed for someone to be found guilty of a crime. Gerry Gleeson, a lecturer at Michigan State University and former state prosecutor, said any criminal investigation into violations of this law would look at national defense, not classification status. “The language of the law, the Espionage Act, doesn’t talk about classification at all, which is not surprising because classification, at least as a structural concept, didn’t exist at the time this was passed,” he said. He said it can apply to people who deliberately transfer the information to someone not authorized to have it or store it in a place it should not be. These individuals also cannot “willfully” retain and fail to deliver documents or other materials on demand to an officer of the United States who is allowed to receive them.Īnyone convicted of violating the law could face a fine or up to 10 years in prison.ĭerek Bambauer, a law professor at the University of Arizona, said the act is a “core” part of national security law and was designed to allow the government to prosecute people with sensitive information that could put the country’s national security at risk. Under the Espionage Act, it is also illegal for anyone who lawfully has possession of information related to national security to provide it or attempt to provide it to those not permitted to obtain it. The Espionage Act makes it illegal for anyone who has information related to national defense to use it “to the injury of the United States” or “to the advantage of any foreign nation.” Officials took three items labeled “confidential,” three labeled “secret” and four labeled “top secret.” The warrant revealed that FBI agents recovered 11 sets of classified items during the search, including one labeled “various classified/TS/SCI documents,” meaning top secret/sensitive compartmentalized information.
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