Special Military Unit Employee Arrested for Disclosing Classified Information to a Journalist

A former Department of the Army civilian employee who had a Top-Secret security clearance with Sensitive Compartmented Information access was arrested by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) last week and charged with transmitting classified national security information to unauthorized persons. Courtney Williams had been an employee with a Special Military Unit (SMU) in North Carolina from 2010 to 2016 and had access to a large amount of classified information as a part of her job.

According to the federal indictment, the FBI investigation discovered Williams had been corresponding with a journalist for the last three years via phone calls and text messages, providing information about the SMU that the journalist was gathering for a book. Even though Williams knew disclosing classified information was illegal and admitted that fact in several text messages by saying she might go to jail, she went ahead with it anyway. The journalist published the book and excerpts of classified information about the SMU were identified and attributed by name in the book back to Williams. That kicked off the FBI investigation and a review of her communications with the journalist.

There are indications that Williams believed she was acting as a “whistleblower” to expose discrimination and sexual harassment within Army SMUs like Delta Force. During her time in the SMU she had filed grievances and complaints to the Inspector General and Equal Opportunity officials and as a result, had her security clearance revoked in what she claims was in retaliation for her complaints. Security Executive Agent Directive (SEAD) 9 is supposed to provide protection to whistleblowers to prevent retaliation or reprisals in this type of situation. It establishes the appellate review process for federal employees alleging security clearance retaliation, and mandates that agencies create processes for investigating and appealing cases where clearances are suspended, denied, or revoked due to protected whistleblower disclosures, as required by 50 U.S.C. § 3341