A West Virginia woman who worked on assignments with the National Security Agency while serving in the Air Force planned to provide the Russian government with secret agency information, prosecutors said Monday.
Elizabeth Jo Shirley, 46, pleaded guilty to one count of intentional withholding of national defense information and international kidnapping of parents, the United States Department of Justice said in a press release.
![FILE: Elizabeth Jo Shirley, the West Virginia woman who previously served in the Air Force.](https://i0.wp.com/a57.foxnews.com/static.foxnews.com/foxnews.com/content/uploads/2020/07/640/320/AP20188832670572-1.jpg?w=618&ssl=1)
FILE: Elizabeth Jo Shirley, the West Virginia woman who previously served in the Air Force.
(West Virginia Division of Corrections and Rehabilitation through AP)
“Ms. Shirley had a duty to safeguard classified information. Instead, she chose to violate the law and the trust placed in it and made plans to pass on national defense information to Russian officials, which could have put at risk our citizens, “said FBI Special Agent Michael Christmas.
Prosecutors said Shirley leased a storage unit and illegally kept a document related to national defense that describes intelligence on military and political affairs of a foreign government.
From 2001 to 2012, Shirley held various positions with the Navy Office of Naval Intelligence, the Departments of Defense and Energy, the National Joint Task Force on Cyber Research, and at least five different licensed defense contractors. It also had high-level security clearances.
The Justice Department statement said Shirley was accused of kidnapping her 6-year-old daughter in July 2019 after failing to return the boy on the agreed date to the girl’s custodial father and wife in West Virginia.
Authorities said Shirley reported that she was having trouble with the car and promised to make the return the next day, but instead left the country.
Prosecutors said Shirley went to Mexico with the intention of contacting the Russian government to request resettlement in a country that would not extradite her to the United States.
While in Mexico, Shirley prepared a written message referring to an “urgent need” to send items from the United States related to her “life’s work before they are seized and destroyed,” prosecutors said.
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Shirley was arrested at a Mexico City hotel last August and the girl was returned to her father. Authorities said the NSA document was found that month in a storage locker in Martinsburg, while messages Shirley had redacted to Russian government officials and other classified information were found on her electronic devices.
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He faces up to 10 years in prison and a $ 250,000 fine for the national security charge and up to three years and a $ 250,000 fine for the kidnapping charge.
Associated Press contributed to this report..