The 21-year-old member of the Massachusetts Air National Guard charged in connection with the leaked documents probe was ordered detained ahead of his trial.
Jack Teixeira appeared in federal court in Worcester, Massachusetts, Friday afternoon for his continued detention hearing.
An undated picture shows Jack Douglas Teixeira, a 21-year-old member of the Air National Guard, who was arrested by the FBI, over his alleged involvement in leaks online of classified documents, posing for a selfie at an unidentified location.
Social Media Website via Reuters
The federal magistrate judge first heard arguments last month over whether Teixeira should be kept in federal custody ahead of his trial. The judge, David Hennessy, said he needed more time to review before making a decision.
Prosecutors have argued that Teixeira is both a flight and national security risk and, if released on bail, they say he could "further disseminate classified information" and "take refuge with a foreign adversary."
Teixeira's public defender, meanwhile, has argued that the airman should be permitted to remain out of pretrial detention in the custody of his father or confined to a home with the presence of either his father, mother, stepfather, Air Force personnel or his lawyers. Teixeira's father testified during the April 27 detention hearing that he was prepared to serve as a third-party custodian pending his son's release.
Teixeira, a native of Dighton, Massachusetts, has been charged with unauthorized retention and transmission of national defense information, as well as willful retention of classified documents, which collectively carry a maximum of 15 years in prison. He has yet to enter a plea.
The FBI-Boston tactical team arrested Teixeira on April 13 and he made an initial appearance in federal court in Boston the following day.
Jack Douglas Teixeira, a U.S. Air Force National Guard airman accused of leaking highly classified military intelligence records online, makes his initial appearance before a federal judge in Boston, on April 14, 2023, in a courtroom sketch.
Margaret Small/Reuters
The criminal complaint alleges that Teixeira "improperly and unlawfully retained and transmitted national defense information to people not authorized to receive it."
The leaked documents apparently contain top-secret information about Russia's war in Ukraine and other parts of the world. Teixeira allegedly accessed a government document on Feb. 23 and posted it online the following day, according to the complaint. It's the disclosure of that one document that forms the basis of the initial charges.
Prosecutors allege Teixeira accessed far more classified information than what was posted. They suggested during last month's detention hearing that given his untrustworthy nature, he would be likely to flee and compared him directly to Edward Snowden.
In a new court filing Wednesday further arguing in support of keeping the defendant behind bars until his trial, prosecutors said Teixeira was twice admonished by his superiors last year over "concerning actions" he took with regard to classified information.
Specifically, Teixeira was told by superiors in September and October "to no longer take notes in any form on classified intelligence information" and to "cease-and-desist on any deep dives into classified intelligence information," prosecutors wrote in the filing.
Not long after the warnings, Teixeira allegedly admitted online in December that he was "breaking a ton of [unauthorized disclosure] regs" but "Idgaf what they say I can or can't share," according to prosecutors' motion.
Teixeira's behavior showed "he will be undeterred by any restrictions this court places upon him and will not hesitate to circumvent those restrictions if he deems it in his interest to do so," prosecutors contended.
Teixeira's defense team also filed a motion ahead of the hearing in support of his pretrial release. His public attorney, Allen Franco, cited prior cases involving people charged with various offenses related to classified information who were permitted to be conditionally released before their trials.
Franco also argued that the government has offered "no evidence" that his client ever intended for information shared online "to be widely disseminated."
ABC News' Luke Barr, Morgan Winsor, Alexander Mallin, Jack Date, Trevor Ault and Christopher Donato contributed to this report.
