Defense lawyers for U.S. National Guardsman Jack Teixeira and prosecutors squared off Thursday over release conditions presented to a federal judge as he hopes to be freed before an espionage trial starts.
Teixeira’s lawyers said online comments and searches he made did not display “an actual ideological desire to harm others,” according to documents filed by his defense team.Government concerns were downplayed due to his comments being shared “primarily among teenagers on a forum dedicated to war/combat-based videogames,” his lawyers added.
“The conspicuous lack of evidence demonstrating that Mr. Teixeira’s online talk reveals a motive or plan to harm others demonstrates once again that the government’s suggestion that Mr. Teixeira is a threat to the public is unsupported for this determination,” Teixeira’s lawyers said.
Teixeira, 21, of North Dighton, is accused of leaking top-secret military documents regarding the war in Ukraine to his internet friends over Discord, a communication platform popular amongst video gamers. Officials said he accessed Discord while employed at the Otis Air National Guard Base on Cape Cod.
He faces six charges of willful retention and transmission of classified national defense information.
Prosecutors argued that Teixeria’s lawyers requested release conditions that present “a fictional version of himself rather than the undeniable reality of the individual he is,” court documents said.
“The defendant’s violent rhetoric combined with an ‘unhealthy’ obsession with firearms, presents a significant danger to the community,” prosecutors said. “And the defendant has also shown through his brazen conduct to date that he has no misgivings about endangering the nation by putting at risk the closely guarded secrets of the United States. Put simply, there are no conditions of release that can adequately mitigate the risks posed by the defendant if released by this court.”
Presiding U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani will decide on the defense’s appeal of a May detention order by U.S. District Court Magistrate Judge David H. Hennessy, who found Teixeria to be a security risk who could flee the country if released on bail.
Last month, Teixeira’s lawyers asked Talwani to reverse the decision by invoking former President Donald Trump, who prosecutors during his second of three indictments did not seek to detain him despite his access to fleeing the country, AP reported.
While Teixeira’s lawyers said the government’s “conspicuous lack of evidence” in demonstrating that the guardsman’s “online talk” was something of major concern, prosecutors called his arguments a red herring and their presentation of Teixeira as “a family-oriented, law-abiding Massachusetts resident” was shattered by Hennessy as “illusion.”
“Pre-arrest flight was not the concern of the government, and the government does not dispute that the defendant did not flee in the days leading up to his arrest,” they said. “Instead, the defendant used those precious days to destroy evidence, to hide his trail of criminal activity, and to urge anyone who would listen not to speak to government agents and to destroy anything traceable to him.”
Prosecutors noted that the weight of the evidence against Teixeira is “voluminous and compelling,” court documents read. They then outline their accusations that Teixeira destroyed evidence, tampered with witnesses, remains a risk to national security and “poses a physical danger to the community,” all of which they assert “weighs in favor of detention.”
- Read more: FBI agent says Jack Teixeira could have more classified documents at North Dighton residences
“The government’s concern continues to be that the defendant will exchange his wealth of knowledge (and any information he did not destroy) for his freedom, or, in the alternative, that the defendant will continue on his destructive, obstructive, and potentially dangerous path if released,” prosecutors said.
Teixeira is due to appear in court for a pretrial conference in September.
