Treasury worker held in leaks of Russia probe info

A Treasury Department employee was charged Wednesday with leaking confidential reports relevant to the special counsel's probe of Russian interference in the 2016 election, including suspicious money transfers involving President Trump's former campaign chairman.

Natalie Mayflower Sours Edwards, 40, leaked “Suspicious Activity Reports” used in 12 news articles, prosecutors charged. A criminal complaint against Edwards, of Quinton, Va., does not name the outlet involved, but lists titles of stories published by Buzzfeed including “Secret Finding: 60 Russian Payments "To Finance Election Campaign Of 2016" and “These 13 Wire Transfers Are A Focus Of The FBI Probe Into Paul Manafort.”

The reports, known as SARs, document suspicious movements of money. Edwards had access to them through her job as a senior adviser in the Treasury Department's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, prosecutors said.

“SARs, which are filed confidentially by banks and other financial institutions to alert law enforcement to potentially illegal transactions, are not public documents, and it is an independent federal crime to disclose them outside of one's official duties,” Manhattan U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman said.

The complaint says Edwards first began communicating with a Buzzfeed reporter, who is not named, in July 2017. The pair allegedly exchanged hundreds of encrypted messages, which Edwards saved on her phone.

Edwards downloaded 24,000 Treasury Department files to a flash drive and saved many of them in a folder labeled “Debacle-OperationCF,” according to the complaint.