A US Department of Defense electrical engineer has turned his world upside down after printing 155 pages from 20 documents, all of which were marked top secret and classified, from his DoD workspace, brought them home with him – and was collared on his way to Mexico.
Gokhan Gun, 51, of Falls Church, Virginia, a dual citizen of the US and Turkey, pleaded guilty in federal court Thursday to unauthorized removal and retention of classified material. Now jobless, he is scheduled to be sentenced on June 17 and faces up to five years in the clink.
As a civilian employee for the DoD, Gun had been granted a top-secret security clearance with access to sensitive compartmented information (SCI). And as such, he had been trained on how to handle and store classified information, and was aware that secret and top-secret documents must "be stored in a [government-approved] security container" or a vault or storage area built to federal standards.
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Read in full; it's delightful (documents shouting TOP SECRET put in full view in a translucent backpack, for example). I won't spoil the punchline.