The Department of Justice detailed its plans Friday for proceeding with a retrial in the government’s case against former CIA engineer and suspected leaker Joshua Adam Schulte.
Geoffrey S. Berman, the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, said in a court filing that he expects a grand jury will be summoned in early June to consider a new indictment charging Schulte with nine counts related to allegedly leaking classified national defense information, including CIA hacking tools published by the website WikiLeaks in 2017.
The prosecutor noted the ongoing novel coronavirus pandemic could put a snag in efforts to arraign Schulte on the new charges and start his retrial as soon as possible, however.
Schulte, 31, previously served as a software engineer for the CIA prior to becoming the government’s main suspect in the leaking of hacking tool and other agency data to WikiLeaks.
He was eventually charged with 11 counts related to the CIA leaks, including multiple violations of the U.S. Espionage Act, in addition to copyright and child pornography charges stemming from a search conducted of Schulte’s computers.
A criminal trial began in Manhattan federal court in early February to consider the 11 national security-related counts, but the jury failed to reach a unanimous verdict on most of the charges and a mistrial was declared, setting the stage for prosecutors to make their case another time.
In a 4-page letter addressed to U.S. District Court Judge Paul A. Crotty, an appointee of former President George W. Bush, Mr. Berman said prosecutors plan to seek the new indictment in mid-June and hope to go to trial “as soon as possible” afterward.
The nine counts contained in the indictment are based on the same conduct at issue during the February trial, Mr. Berman wrote in the letter, which includes allegations that Schulte first leaked classified material first to WikiLeaks and then again to members of the news media while awaiting trial.
Unlike the last indictment, however, Mr. Berman said the new one does not include a count for theft of government property. It also contains two separate counts relating to allegedly transmitting and attempting to transmit classified information about his case while imprisoned at Metropolitan Correctional Center in Manhattan, whereas the previous indictment combined them into a single count, Mr. Berman noted.
The prosecutor also said in the letter that he expects Schulte’s second trial for the leaking charges to be “substantially shorter” than his first, citing factors such as fewer witnesses being presented by the Justice Department and the defense’s familiarity with the government’s case.
Sabrina Shroff and Edward Zas, a pair of public defenders who represented Schulte during his first trial, declined to comment on the letter when reached by The Washington Times.
Schulte was found guilty in March of making false statements to law enforcement and contempt of court. He has not yet been tried on the copyright and child porn charges.
Julian Assange, the Australian-born founder and publisher of WikiLeaks, is wanted in the U.S. on criminal charges related to previously releasing classified material through the website, meanwhile. He is currently imprisoned in London fighting extradition.
• Andrew Blake can be reached at ablake@washingtontimes.com.
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