Pentagon contractor indicted over alleged leak tied to raided Washington Post reporter

A federal grand jury in Maryland has indicted a Pentagon contractor whose alleged leaking of classified documents sparked an “outrageous” FBI raid on a Washington Post reporter’s home.

According to the justice department, Aurelio Luis Perez-Lugones illegally provided sensitive and secret information “related to national defense” to a reporter who it says then wrote and published at least five articles using it.

The indictment was not immediately available, and a press release announcing five charges against Perez-Lugones of mishandling classified information did not identify the journalist or their employer.

On 14 January, the FBI raided the Virginia home of the Post reporter Hannah Natanson in what the newspaper called a “highly unusual and aggressive” move, and seized items including two laptops, a hard drive and a recording device, her smart watch and a mobile phone.

In a subsequent development this week, a federal judge temporarily blocked prosecutors from reviewing material taken in the raid while the court reviews a request by the Post to return Natanson’s equipment.

Perez-Lugones, 61, of Laurel, Maryland, was arrested on 8 January and has remained in jail since. The navy veteran held a top secret security clearance as a systems engineer and information technology specialist for a defense department contractor.

In announcing the indictment on Thursday, Kash Patel, the FBI director, said in a statement: “Perez-Lugones allegedly printed and removed classified documents from his workplace on multiple occasions, took them home, and later passed them to a reporter who used the information in news articles.

“Protecting our country’s secrets is essential to the safety of our most sensitive intelligence, military, and law enforcement operations. The FBI will continue to aggressively investigate everyone who seeks to undermine our national security and hold them accountable.”

According to the US attorney’s office for the district of Maryland, Perez-Lugones took screenshots of top secret documents on several occasions since October, and pasted them in Microsoft Word documents and other applications to hide his “unauthorized review and access”.

He then illegally transmitted photographs of the confidential documents, prosecutors say. He is alleged to have later used an encrypted messaging app to write to an individual identified as “Reporter 1”, saying: “I’m going quiet for a bit … just to see if anyone starts asking questions.”

Investigators also found a lunch box in his car containing a document marked as “SECRET”, the statement from the attorney’s office said.

“Additionally, while searching Perez-Lugones’s residence, investigators located a document in the basement of the residence also marked as ‘SECRET’. One or more of these documents are related to national defense,” it said.

In the statement, Kelly Hayes, the US attorney for the district of Maryland, said: “The indictment charges that Perez-Lugones willfully transmitted national defense information to a news reporter, placing our national security at risk.

“Protecting sensitive national security information is a core responsibility of the Department of Justice, and the US Attorney’s Office, and our law enforcement partners will pursue accountability when that trust is violated. Putting it simply, risking our national security cannot and will not be tolerated.”

Attorneys for Perez-Lugones did not immediately respond to an email from the Associated Press seeking comment.

If convicted, he faces up to 10 years in federal prison for each count of retention and transmission of national defense information, the US attorney’s office said.

Press freedom advocates at the time of the raid on Natanson’s residence called it “a tremendous escalation in the [Trump] administration’s intrusions” into media independence.

“Physical searches of reporters’ devices, homes and belongings are some of the most invasive investigative steps law enforcement can take. There are specific federal laws and policies at the Department of Justice that are meant to limit searches to the most extreme cases,” Bruce D Brown, the president of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, said.

In a statement on Wednesday in support of its motion to return Natanson’s equipment, the Post said: “The outrageous seizure of our reporter’s confidential newsgathering materials chills speech, cripples reporting, and inflicts irreparable harm every day the government keeps its hands on these materials.

“We have asked the court to order the immediate return of all seized materials and prevent their use. Anything less would license future newsroom raids and normalize censorship by search warrant.”

On Friday, an alliance of press freedom groups wrote to Congress demanding an investigation.

“By raiding Hannah Natanson’s home and seizing her devices, the government threatened bedrock principles of our constitution and a free society,” Emily Peterson-Cassin, the policy director of Demand Progress, said.

“Congress has a responsibility to investigate whether the government is undermining the first amendment and a free press by targeting and threatening a reporter like this.”