Air National Guardsman Jack Teixeira will plead guilty to leaking classified military information in a case from last year that was considered one of the most serious U.S. national security breaches in years, a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s office in Boston said on Thursday.
Prosecutors say Teixeira, who was 21 at the time of his arrest in June last year, leaked classified documents to a group of gamers on the messaging app Discord.
The material included highly sensitive U.S. military assessments, including on the war in Ukraine.
The leak was considered the worst U.S. national security breach since more than 700,000 documents, videos and diplomatic cables appeared on the WikiLeaks website in 2010.
The documents leaked on Discord included highly classified information on U.S. allies and adversaries, with details ranging from Ukraine’s air defences to Israel’s Mossad spy agency.
President Joe Biden had ordered an investigation into why the leaker had access to the sensitive information.
Teixeira, of North Dighton, Massachusetts, was indicted last year on six counts of willful retention and transmission of classified information relating to national defence.