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An employee of the Air Force assigned to the U.S. Strategic Command was arrested on Saturday for allegedly sharing classified national defense information (NDI) on a dating site.
According to a Department of Justice press release, David Franklin Slater, 63, who worked at at Offutt Air Force Base in Nebraska, was charged with conspiring to transmit and transmitting classified information relating to the national defense on a foreign online dating platform beginning in or around February 2022 until in or around April 2022.
Slater, a retired Lieutenant Colonel from the U.S. Army, reportedly held a Top Secret security clearance from in or around August 2021 until in or around April 2022.
The indictment claims that Slater “willfully, improperly, and unlawfully transmitted NDI classified as ‘SECRET,’ which he had reason to believe could be used to the injury of the United States or to the advantage of a foreign nation, on a foreign online dating platform to a person not authorized to receive such information.”
Oh boy, did he.
Not only did he allegedly provide a woman with classified information about the war in Ukraine, he appears to have had the pants charmed off him in the process.
“As alleged, Mr. Slater, an Air Force civilian employee and retired U.S. Army Lieutenant Colonel, knowingly transmitted classified national defense information to another person in blatant disregard for the security of his country and his oath to safeguard its secrets,” said Assistant Attorney General Matthew G. Olsen of the Justice Department’s National Security Division.
Slater faces a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison, three years of supervised release, and a fine of up to $250,000 for each count of conspiracy to transmit and the transmission of national defense information.
In semi-related news, Jack Teixeira, the 21-year-old Massachusetts Air National Guard member who was arrested in April 2023 for leaking classified documents in a Discord group, agreed to plead guilty to six counts of willful retention and transmission of classified information relating to the national defense this week.
“By knowingly and improperly posting classified national defense information on a social media platform, Mr. Teixeira callously disregarded the national security of the United States and betrayed the trust of the American people he swore to protect,” said Assistant Attorney General Matthew G. Olsen of the Justice Department’s National Security Division.
He too now faces up to 10 years in prison, three years of supervised release and a fine of up to $250,000.