The member of the Massachusetts Air National Guard accused of improper disclosure of classified information, Jack Teixeira, challenged his preventive detention on Tuesday using the case of Donald Trump.
The former president and other defendants in a case that also involves documents classified as maximum security will await trial in freedom.
The judge who ruled in May that Teixeira, 21, should remain in custody understood that his release could lead him to leave the country or obstruct justice.
Teixeira’s lawyers now intend to reverse this decision.
In their appeal, the lawyers argued that Teixeira does not have the financial capacity or incentives to flee and considered that the government “more than exaggerates the risk he poses to national security.”
On the other hand, they indicated that the prosecutors did not want to arrest Trump, nor another defendant -Walt Nauta-, although the former president and his collaborator “have extraordinary means to leave the United States.”
As they noted, “Former President Trump and the Trump Organization own properties in multiple countries and former President Trump has access to a private plane. But the flight risk posed by his knowledge of national security information and his ability to fly did not even prompt a passport surrender request.”
Teixeira’s lawyers wrote that “the differentiated approach” in these cases, both based on the Espionage Law, demonstrates that “the argument [do governo] because the detention of Teixeira is illusory”.
In June, Jack Teixeira pleaded “not guilty” to six counts of illegal possession and transmission of national defense information, each punishable by up to 10 years in prison.
Teixeira has been in prison since his arrest in April. His lawyers have suggested that he should be released, entrusted to his father and confined to his home, with location monitoring and no internet access.
Teixeira is accused of sharing classified military documents about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and other sensitive national security issues on Discord, a social media platform popular with video game players.
Source: TSF
