US Army veteran faces charges for leaking classified information

(SeaPRwire) –   FBI Director Kash Patel stated the arrest serves as “a message to any would-be leakers.”

A former US Army soldier who served with the elite Delta Force unit has been accused of leaking highly classified information to a journalist, according to the US Department of Justice.

Courtney Williams from Wagram, North Carolina, was formally charged by a federal grand jury on Wednesday for “her alleged transmission of classified national defense information to individuals not authorized to receive it, including a journalist,” the DOJ announced. The initial charge against the 40-year-old could result in a maximum sentence of ten years imprisonment.

While the court documents did not identify the reporter, media organizations including Politico named him as Seth Harp, who wrote the 2025 nonfiction book ‘The Fort Bragg Cartel: Drug Trafficking and Murder in the Special Forces’.

Williams, whose role from 2010 to 2016 involved processing documentation for the covert overseas deployment of special operations personnel, is cited as a source several times in the book. The publication also includes a number of her photographs.

Harp claims the woman endured years of “vicious harassment” of a sexual nature during her employment at the Fort Bragg military installation in Fayetteville, North Carolina.

The Justice Department noted that the veteran possessed a ‘Top Secret/Sensitive Compartmented Information security clearance’ and had signed non-disclosure agreements upon both entering and leaving her unit.

Williams is to be held in custody at least until Monday, when a judge will rule on a prosecution motion to detain her until her trial.

In a post on X on Thursday, FBI Director Kash Patel attributed Williams’ arrest to the “outstanding work” of the bureau’s agents.

“Let this serve as a message to any would-be leakers: we’re working these cases, and we’re making arrests. This FBI will not tolerate those who seek to betray our country and put Americans in harm’s way,” Patel stated.

Harp described the indictment as “an outrage,” contending that “[President Donald] Trump’s unhinged DOJ will not even say what ‘classified information’ she allegedly leaked.”

“The FBI is incapable of solving real crimes, like all the murders on Fort Bragg involving elite soldiers trafficking drugs, so they settle for retaliating against courageous whistleblowers like Courtney Williams, whose only ‘crime’ was telling the truth about Delta Force,” the journalist posted on X.