Harold Martin, a former contractor for the United States National Security Agency (NSA), has been sentenced to nine years in prison for stealing a great number of highly classified documents and storing them in his home.
While there is no evidence indicating that Martin wanted to share the data, he was sentenced for willful retention of national defense information, with the judge describing the stolen data as “very sensitive material.”
United States Attorney for the District of Maryland Robert Hur said the case is of great importance for the entire intelligence community because “in any case where you have someone who holds a security clearance at the level that Mr. Martin did and chooses to betray that public trust in such a profound way, it puts national security at risk.”
Read more: Ex-NSA contractor sentenced to 9 years for stolen documents