A US Army sergeant has been charged with leaking classified information to China in exchange for $42,000 after prosecutors said he repeatedly sent sensitive documents about some of the military’s most advanced weapons to a foreign national claiming to live in Hong Kong.
Prosecutors said Sergeant Korbein Schultz, who served as an intelligence analyst with the 506th Infantry Battalion, repeatedly used his Top Secret security clearance to access classified documents, which he then allegedly sent to the foreign national.
Schultz has been charged with conspiracy to obtain and disclose national defense information, exporting technical data related to defense articles without a license, conspiracy to export defense articles without a license and bribery of a public official.
It was not immediately clear whether Schultz has legal representation.
“The unauthorized sale of such information violates our national security laws, compromises our safety, and cannot be tolerated,” said Henry C. Leventis, US attorney for the Middle District of Tennessee.
The foreign national, identified only as Conspirator A in the federal indictment, contacted Schultz during the summer of 2022, asking for information about lessons learned from the war in Ukraine and what that taught the US about defending Taiwan. Prosecutors said Schultz was paid $200 for the first documents.
According to prosecutors, that relationship quickly grew.
In July of that year, Schultz told Conspirator A that he wanted to turn their relationship into a long-term partnership, according to the indictment. Over the next several months, Schultz allegedly began sending Conspirator A documents about the HIMARS rocket launcher system, hypersonic missiles, information about China’s military and the F-22…
Read the full article here