A Virginia man has been arrested for illegally keeping over 1,000 classified documents about national defense in his basement home, with some in trash bags, the Department of Justice announced.
Ashley Tellis, 64, a U.S. citizen residing in Vienna, Virginia, was arrested on Oct. 11 in connection with his alleged unlawful retention of classified national defense information. Tellis appeared in the Eastern District of Virginia for a detention hearing.
Court documents say Tellis held a Top Secret security clearance with Sensitive Compartmented Information (SCI) access. He has worked for the U.S. Department of State since 2001 and currently serves in addition as a contractor for the Department of Defense’s Office of Net Assessment.
He also serves as a Senior Fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
“Safeguarding our country’s national defense information is a top priority,” said Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Sue J. Bai of the Justice Department’s National Security Division. “For those entrusted with our country’s most sensitive information, protecting it is a privilege and solemn responsibility. With the hard work and dedication of our prosecutors and agents, we will hold this defendant accountable for breaching that trust and exploiting his security clearance to unlawfully retain classified information detailing our military capabilities.”
As alleged, Tellis accessed classified documents on multiple occasions from secured facilities, including a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility at the Department of Defense and a secure computer system at the Department of State.
“The FBI arrested Ashley Tellis, a senior advisor at the Department of State and a contractor within the Department of Defense, for allegedly removing over a thousand pages of classified national defense information from government facilities and storing them in his home,” said Assistant Director Roman Rozhavsky of the FBI’s Counterintelligence Division. “This arrest should serve as a stark warning to anyone thinking about undermining national security. The FBI and our partners will do everything within our power to find you and hold you accountable.”
During a court-authorized search of Tellis’s residence, investigators recovered over 1,000 pages of documents with classification markings, including materials labeled SECRET and/or TOP SECRET. These documents were found in locked filing cabinets, in a basement home office, and in trash bags stored in a basement utility area.
In one instance, Tellis altered the filename of a classified document, printed portions of it under the altered title, and then deleted the renamed file. In another incident, he was observed placing classified materials into a notepad and concealing them within his personal briefcase before leaving a secured government facility.
“We are fully focused on protecting the American people from all threats, foreign and domestic. The charges as alleged in this case represent a grave risk to the safety and security of our citizens,” said U.S. Attorney Halligan for the Eastern District of Virginia. “The facts and the law in this case are clear, and we will continue following them to ensure that justice is served.”
The FBI Washington Field Office is investigating the case, with valuable assistance from the Air Force Office of Special Investigations and the Department of State’s Diplomatic Security Service.
“U.S. government security clearance holders are entrusted to keep our nation’s most sensitive secrets safe,” said Assistant Director in Charge Darren B. Cox of the FBI Washington Field Office. “By allegedly removing classified documents from government facilities and storing them in his basement, Mr. Tellis betrayed that trust. The FBI and our federal partners acted quickly to execute a court-authorized search warrant and arrest Tellis to protect our national security and prevent highly classified defense information from falling into the wrong hands.”
Assistant U.S. Attorney Seth Schlessinger for the Eastern District of Virginia and Trial Attorney Leslie Esbrook of the National Security Division’s Counterintelligence and Export Control Section are prosecuting the case.
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