Ex-NSA contractor accused of hoarding classified info to plead guilty - Suspected of being the Shadow Brokers Source
Ex-NSA contractor accused of hoarding classified info to
plead guilty
By JOSH GERSTEIN 01/03/2018 12:39 PM EST Updated
01/03/2018 12:46 PM EST
A former National Security Agency contractor accused of
stealing a massive quantity of classified information over two decades has
agreed to plead guilty to a felony charge of illegal retention of national
security information.
The ex-NSA worker, Harold Martin, 53, however, has not
reached a full agreement with prosecutors to resolve the twenty felony charges
he was indicted on after being arrested in 2016 during a raid of his Maryland
home.
The move appears to be a gamble by Martin's defense that
the government will conclude that a trial on the remaining charges is
unnecessary, particularly given the possibility that it will disclose sensitive
details about the capabilities of the NSA and other U.S. intelligence agencies.
Martin, who's been held without bail since his arrest
nearly a year and a half ago, could be sentenced to up to 10 years on the
charge to which he is offering to plead guilty.
U.S. District Court Judge Marvin Garbis, who sits in
Baltimore, has scheduled a January 22 hearing to receive Martin’s plea.
Prosecutors said in a court filing that sentencing
guidelines will call for Martin to receive the full 10 years. However, government
lawyers have agreed to postpone sentencing until all other counts are resolved
— an arrangement which suggests some possibility the other charges could be
dropped.
Martin reportedly spent several years working in NSA's
elite hacking unit, known as Tailored Access Operations. Investigators
initially suspected his removal of classified files from NSA headquarters led
to a public disclosure of U.S. hacking tools released online by a group calling
itself the Shadow Brokers.
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