Guardsman’s family voice support
Say they hope he will get ‘just treatment’
The family of Jack D. Teixeira, the Massachusetts Air National Guardsman charged with leaking military secrets online, said in a statement Friday night that they support him and hope he receives “fair and just treatment” as his case unfolds.
The statement was released by a family spokesman to various television news outlets as a judge is weighing the government’s request to keep 21-yearold Teixeira jailed while awaiting trial on charges that he violated the Espionage Act by allegedly leaking hundreds of classified military documents about the war in Ukraine and other sensitive matters online.
Teixeira, who was assigned to Otis Air Force Base on Cape Cod, has been held since he was arrested April 13 at the Dighton home where he lives with his mother and stepfather.
The Guardsman’s family, in a statement released to WHDHTV Friday, said they were “standing together in solidarity and support” of Teixeira “through this very difficult and confusing ordeal.”
“We know there are more questions now than answers and are hopeful that Jack will receive the fair and just treatment to which he is entitled during this investigation,” the family said. “His health and safety are now and will be our top priority.”
Teixeira, who held top secret security clearance, was essentially an information technology support specialist and used his clearance to access classified documents that “had no bearing” on his military role, prosecutors allege in court filings. He’s accused of sharing documents on the Discord social media platform.
Prosecutors have also alleged in court papers that Teixeira used his security clearance to look up information about mass shootings. He allegedly left online postings in which he said he would like to kill people, discussed how to create an “assassination van,” and expressed hope that terrorists would bomb the World Cup, according to prosecutors.
US Magistrate Judge David H. Hennessy, who heard from prosecutors and Teixeira’s public defenders during a hearing Thursday in federal court in Worcester, has yet to rule on whether to keep Teixeira in custody. He has been held at the Plymouth jail since his arrest.
During the hearing, Teixeira’s lawyer, Brendan O. Kelley, urged the judge to release Teixeira on bail, arguing that he has strong family ties, no criminal record, and should be allowed to live with his father in Dighton with certain restrictions — including no access to the Internet or guns.
“Mr. Teixeira remains a 21year-old kid,” Kelley said.
Teixeira’s father, Jack Michael Teixeira, testified at the hearing that he would closely monitor his son and report him if he violated any conditions of his release.
The elder Teixeira is a former correctional officer at Bridgewater State Hospital and now works at a horticultural company in Sudbury.
But prosecutors argued that the younger Teixeira should not be released under any conditions because he is likely to flee or obstruct justice. Teixeira could face up to 25 years in prison if convicted, according to prosecutors.
In court filings, prosecutors said Teixeira was suspended from high school in 2018 for making “racial threats,” and talking about guns at school and Molotov cocktails.
At the time, Teixeira claimed he was talking about a video game, though other students disputed that, prosecutors said. Teixeira’s lawyers said in their own filing that the suspension lasted “a handful of days” and he was allowed to return to school after completing a professional psychiatric evaluation.
The suspension did not prevent him from joining the National Guard in 2019. Teixeira was initially denied a gun permit by Dighton police because of the high school incident, but he obtained it in 2020 after telling Dighton police he held a military security clearance.
Teixeira owned several weapons, including handguns, rifles, shotguns, and “an AK-style highcapacity weapon” that were found stored in a gun locker about two feet from his bed during a search of his home, according to court filings. A silencer-style accessory was found in a desk drawer during the search, according to authorities.
Teixeira‘s attorneys noted that he legally owns the weapons and said they were properly stored in a gun safe.
“He is not unique in collecting and utilizing firearms,” Kelley said Thursday. “Some people are car guys. Some people like books. Some people collect guns.”
In the days before his arrest, Teixeira said he would stop posting information online, and asked another Internet user to delete previous messages, prosecutors said.
Prosecutors also argued that Teixeira may still have access to classified information and would likely flee the country if released on bail.
That information “would be of tremendous value to hostile nation states that could offer him safe harbor and attempt to facilitate his escape from the United States,” prosecutors wrote in a court filing last week.