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US-CRIME-INTELLIGENCE
Senate Intel Committee veteran arrested for lying to FBI over leaks
WASHINGTON, June 8, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – A former Senate Intelligence Committee
staff member was arrested and indicted on charges of lying to FBI agents over
press leaks, the Department of Justice said Thursday, in an investigation
that saw the records of a New York Times journalist seized.
James Wolfe, 58, was indicted on three counts of making false statements
about his contacts with three reporters.
Authorities said he also lied to the FBI about providing two of those
reporters with private information about the work of the committee, of which
he was director of security for around 29 years.
In his position, Wolfe had access to secret and top-secret information. He
is set to appear before a federal court in Washington on Friday.
As part of the probe, the Justice Department seized years of records
related to two email accounts and a phone number belonging to one Ali
Watkins, the Times reported.
It added that Watkins had been in a three-year romantic relationship with
Wolfe. Wolfe’s indictment references an admission to FBI agents in 2017 that
he had falsely denied being in a relationship since 2014 with an unnamed
reporter.
The Times said it learned of a February letter informing Watkins her
records had been obtained on Thursday, adding those records covered a period
before she started working for the Times in late 2017. The content of those
communications was not obtained.
It spells the first known case of a journalist’s records being seized
under the Trump administration, which is engaged in a crackdown on leakers.
BSS/AFP/MR/1030 hrs