Kanawha County Circuit Judge Richard D. Lindsay made the ruling after hearing arguments in a lawsuit by a civic organization that argued Republican Gov. Patrick Morrisey exceeded his authority when he authorized the Guard’s deployment in August.

“The question before this court is whether or not state law allows West Virginia to do this,” Lindsay said. “The court has found that.”

The judge added: “This court believes that the federal law allows for the request made by the president to the governor.”

West Virginia is among several states that sent National Guard members to the nation’s capital. While the state National Guard has said its deployment could last until the end of November, it is consulting with the governor’s office and others on the possibility of extending the stay.

Formal orders were issued last week extending the deployment of the District of Columbia’s National Guard in the city through the end of February.

“We are pleased with the judge’s decision,” Jace Goins, the state’s chief deputy attorney general, said outside the court in Charleston. “The National Guard are going nowhere. They’re staying in D.C. They’re not going to be redeployed to West Virginia.

“The judge made the determination that the governor made a lawful decision deploying the National Guard to D.C. by a lawful request of the president.”

The West Virginia Citizen Action Group, which filed the lawsuit, argued that under state law the governor could deploy the National Guard out of state only for certain purposes, such as responding to a natural disaster or another state’s emergency request.

The civic group claimed that it was harmed by the deployment by being forced to refocus its resources away from government accountability and transparency. The state attorney general’s office sought to reject the case, saying the group has not been harmed and lacked standing to challenge Morrisey’s decision.

“It was a simple issue of a broad, lawful request by the president and a lawful deployment by the governor. That’s all,” Goins said.

Aubrey Sparks, an attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union’s West Virginia chapter, said she didn’t believe it was the correct decision.

“I think that West Virginia law is clear,” Sparks said. “I think what the state was permitted to do here is to skirt past West Virginia law simply because Trump asked them to. And that’s not how the law works. We remain deeply concerned about it.”

Trump issued an executive order in August declaring a crime emergency in the nation’s capital, although the Department of Justice itself says violent crime there is at a 30-year low.

Within a month, more than 2,300 Guard troops from eight states and the District of Columbia were patrolling under the Army secretary’s command. Trump also deployed hundreds of federal agents to assist them.

Separately, a federal judge heard arguments Oct. 24 on District of Columbia Attorney General Brian Schwalb’s request for an order that would remove National Guard members from Washington streets. U.S. District Judge Jia Cobb, an appointee of former President Joe Biden, did not rule from the bench.

Austin was hospitalized Jan. 1 and admitted to intensive care after developing an infection a week after undergoing surgery. He was released from Walter Reed National Military Medical Center on Monday.

On the Jan. 1 call to the Fairfax County Department of Public Safety, a man who identified himself as a government employee described Austin as alert. The identity of Austin and the caller were redacted from a copy of the 911 audio, which was obtained by The Associated Press under the Freedom of Information Act. The caller named the street on which Austin lives.

In the four-minute call, the reason for needing the ambulance also was redacted. The caller said Austin was not having chest pains.

“Can I ask, like, can the ambulance not show up with lights and sirens? Um, we’re trying to remain a little subtle,” the aide said, according to the recording.

A dispatcher responded that the ambulance would comply once it got near the home.

“Usually when they turn into a residential neighborhood, they’ll turn them off,” the dispatcher said, adding that emergency sirens and lights are required by law on major roads when ambulances are responding to a call.

Austin was located on the ground floor of the residence, said the aide, who indicated he would be waiting outside for the ambulance.

The caller asked how long it would take to get to the home. The dispatcher said it depended on traffic and road conditions and said first responders would be arriving from the closest available station.

Details of the 911 audio file from the Fairfax County Public Safety Department were first reported by The Daily Beast.

As he recovers, Austin will be working from home. His doctors said he “progressed well throughout his stay and his strength is rebounding.” They said in a statement the cancer was treated early and his prognosis is “excellent.”

Austin, 70, was admitted to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center on Dec. 22 and underwent surgery to treat the cancer, which was detected earlier in the month during a routine screening.

Dr. John Maddox, the trauma medical director, and Dr. Gregory Chesnut, the director of the Center for Prostate Disease Research at Walter Reed, said that during Austin’s hospitalization he underwent medical tests and was treated for lingering leg pain. They said he has physical therapy to do but there are no plans for further cancer treatment other than regular checks.

President Joe Biden and senior administration officials were not told about Austin’s hospitalization until Jan. 4, and Austin kept the cancer diagnosis secret until Jan. 9. Biden has said Austin’s failure to tell him about the hospitalization was a lapse in judgment, but the Democratic president insists he still has confidence in his Pentagon chief.

During Austin’s time at Walter Reed, the U.S. launched a series of military strikes late last week on the Iranian-backed Houthis in Yemen, targeting dozens of locations linked to their campaign of assaults on commercial shipping in the Red Sea. Working from his hospital bed, Austin juggled calls with senior military leaders, including Gen. Erik Kurilla, head of U.S. Central Command, and White House meetings to review, order and ultimately watch the strikes unfold over secure video.

The lack of transparency about Austin’s hospitalization, however, has triggered administration and Defense Department reviews on the procedures for notifying the White House and others if a Cabinet member must transfer decision-making authorities to a deputy, as Austin did during his initial surgery and a portion of his latest hospital stay. And the White House chief of staff ordered Cabinet members to notify his office if they ever can’t perform their duties.

Austin’s secrecy also drew criticism from Congress members on both sides of the political aisle, and Rep. Mike Rogers, an Alabama Republican who is chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, said he has opened a formal inquiry into the matter. Others openly called for Austin to resign, but the White House has said the Pentagon chief’s job is safe.

It is still unclear when Austin will return to his office in the Pentagon or how his cancer treatment will affect his job, travel and other public engagements going forward. Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks has been taking on some of his day-to-day duties as he recovers.

U.S. District Judge Gina Groh, who in August rejected earlier plea agreements that had called for reduced sentencing guidelines, sentenced Jonathan Toebbe to more than 19 years and his wife, Diana Toebbe, to nearly 22 years. The sentences were handed down on Jonathan Toebbe’s 44th birthday.

The Annapolis, Maryland, couple and their attorneys described the defendants’ struggles with mental health issues and alcohol and said they were anxious about the nation’s political climate when they sold secrets in exchange for $100,000 in cryptocurrency.

Groh said their tale “reads like a crime novel or a movie script” and that Jonathan Toebbe’s “actions and greedy self-serving intentions placed military service members at sea and every citizen of this country in a vulnerable position and at risk of harm from adversaries.”

Diana Toebbe, who admitted acting as a lookout for her husband, received an enhanced sentence after the judge disclosed during the couple’s combined five-hour sentencing hearing that Diana Toebbe tried to send her husband two letters from jail.

The letters, which were read in court, were intercepted before they could be delivered. In one of them, Diana Toebbe told her husband to flush the letter down a toilet after reading it. She encouraged him to lie about her involvement in the scheme and say she “didn’t know anything about any of this.”

The judge said she lacked genuine remorse and didn’t take responsibility for her actions.

“This is an exceptional story, right out of the movies,” Groh said.

Prior to sentencing, Jonathan Toebbe described his battles with stress in taking on additional duties and his own battle with alcohol. He said he experienced warning signs of a nervous breakdown over 18 months that he failed to recognize.

“I believed that my family was in dire threat, that democracy itself was under collapse,” he said. That belief overwhelmed him, he said, and led him to believe he had to take “precipitous action to try to save them from grave harm.”

Prosecutors said Toebbe abused his access to top-secret government information and repeatedly sold details about the design and performance of Virginia-class submarines to someone he believed was a representative of a foreign government but who was actually an undercover FBI agent.

Diana Toebbe, 46, who was teaching at a private school in Maryland at the time of the couple’s arrest last October, admitted she acted as a lookout at several prearranged “dead-drop” locations where memory cards containing the secret information were left behind.

The memory cards were devices concealed in objects such as a chewing gum wrapper and a peanut butter sandwich. The couple was arrested in October 2021 after Jonathan Toebbe placed a card in Jefferson County, West Virginia.

None of the information was classified as top secret or secret, falling into a third category considered confidential, according to previous testimony.

The couple was sentenced for their guilty pleas in September in federal court in Martinsburg, West Virginia, to one felony count each of conspiracy to communicate restricted data.

In August, Groh rejected their initial guilty pleas to the same charges, saying the sentencing options were “strikingly deficient” considering the seriousness of the case. The previous sentencing range agreed to by lawyers for Jonathan Toebbe had called for a potential punishment of up to 17 years in prison. Prosecutors had sought three years for Diana Toebbe.

During a hearing last December, Diana Toebbe’s attorney, Barry Beck, asserted that the couple was looking to flee the United States due to their contempt for then-President Donald Trump.

During a search of the couple’s home, FBI agents found a trash bag of shredded documents, thousands of dollars in cash, valid children’s passports and a “go-bag” containing a USB flash drive and latex gloves, according to previous testimony.

She said her decision to participate in the scheme was “catastrophic,” as she is the mother of children ages 12 and 16, and that she should have tried to talk her husband out of it.

“I didn’t think of my children, who have suffered the most,” she said. “Their lives will forever be marked by the decision that I made.”

Groh said that choice was “deliberate and calculated.” She admonished Beck, who had labeled his client as merely an accomplice in seeking a lesser sentence.

“Your client put this country in great danger,” Groh told Beck. “No matter what you call it, the harm to this nation was great.”

The FBI has said the scheme began in April 2020, when Jonathan Toebbe sent a package of Navy documents to a foreign government and expressed interest in selling operations manuals, performance reports and other sensitive information. That package was obtained by the FBI in December 2020 through its legal attaché office in an unspecified foreign country, setting off a months-long undercover operation.

An FBI agent posing as a foreign government’s representative made contact with Toebbe, ultimately paying in cryptocurrency for the information Toebbe was offering.

Groh said about $54,000 of the cryptocurrency has been recovered. She imposed fines of around $50,000 to each defendant.

Jonathan and Diana Toebbe of Annapolis, Maryland, pleaded guilty in federal court in Martinsburg, West Virginia, to one felony count each of conspiracy to communicate restricted data.

U.S. District Judge Gina Groh last month rejected the couple’s initial pleas to the same charges, saying the sentencing options were “strikingly deficient” considering the seriousness of the case. The couple then immediately withdrew their initial guilty pleas and Groh set trial for January.

The previous sentencing range agreed to by lawyers for Jonathan Toebbe had called for a potential punishment between roughly 12 years and 17 years in prison. Prosecutors said Tuesday that such a sentence would be one of the most significant imposed in modern times under the Atomic Energy Act of 1954. Prosecutors also sought three years for Diana Toebbe.

Under the latest plea agreement entered Tuesday before U.S. Magistrate Judge Robert Trumble, the couple would each face a maximum sentence of life in prison and a $100,000 fine, although prosecutors are asking for a sentence for Diana Toebbe at the lowest end of the guideline range.

If the court doesn’t accept the latest agreement, the defendants would again have the right to withdraw their guilty pleas.

Prosecutors said Jonathan Toebbe, 43, abused his access to top-secret government information and repeatedly sold details about the design elements and performance characteristics of Virginia-class submarines to someone he believed was a representative of a foreign government but who was actually an undercover FBI agent.

Diana Toebbe, 46, who was teaching at a private school in Maryland at the time of the couple’s arrest last October, was accused of acting as a lookout at several prearranged “dead-drop” locations at which memory cards containing the secret information were left behind.

The memory cards were devices concealed in objects such as a chewing gum wrapper and a peanut butter sandwich. The couple was arrested after he placed a memory card at a dead drop location in Jefferson County, West Virginia.

None of the information was classified as top secret or secret, falling into a third category considered confidential, according to previous testimony.

The FBI has said the scheme began in April 2020, when Jonathan Toebbe sent a package of Navy documents to a foreign government and wrote that he was interested in selling to that country operations manuals, performance reports and other sensitive information. He included in the package, which had a Pittsburgh return address, instructions to his supposed contact for how to establish a covert relationship with him, prosecutors said.

That package was obtained by the FBI in December 2020 through its legal attaché office in the unspecified foreign country. That set off a monthslong undercover operation in which an agent posing as a representative of a foreign country made contact with Toebbe, ultimately paying $100,000 in cryptocurrency in exchange for the information Toebbe was offering.

The country to which he was looking to sell the information has not been identified in court documents and was not disclosed in court.

Prosecutors said the government has recovered classified information that Jonathan Toebbe had saved on electronic devices along with a “substantial amount” of the cryptocurrency.

During a search of the couple’s home, FBI agents found a trash bag of shredded documents, thousands of dollars in cash, valid children’s passports and a “go-bag” containing a USB flash drive and latex gloves, according to court testimony last year.

Diana Toebbe’s lawyers at a December 2021 hearing denied prosecution assertions that cited 2019 messages exchanged by the couple in which she had contemplated fleeing the United States to avoid arrest. Instead, the defense said it was contempt for then-President Donald Trump as the reason behind the couple’s emigration plans.

Jonathan and Diana Toebbe of Annapolis, Maryland, pleaded guilty in February in federal court in Martinsburg, West Virginia, to one count each of conspiracy to communicate restricted data.

The sentencing range agreed to by lawyers for Jonathan Toebbe had called for a potential punishment between roughly 12 years and 17 years in prison. Prosecutors said Tuesday that such a sentence would be one of the most significant imposed in modern times under the Atomic Energy Act of 1954. Prosecutors also sought three years for Diana Toebbe.

U.S. District Judge Gina Groh said that while she generally honors plea agreements, in this case she said the sentencing options were “strikingly deficient” considering the seriousness of the charges.

Groh said the act to which the couple pleaded guilty was done “for selfish and greedy reasons, but could have caused great harm” to the Navy and others.

“I don’t find any justifiable reasons for accepting either one of these plea agreements,” Groh said.

Wearing orange jail jumpsuits and seated at separate tables, the couple then separately withdrew their guilty pleas, leading Groh to set a trial date for Jan. 17.

Prosecutors said Jonathan Toebbe abused his access to top-secret government information and repeatedly sold details about the design elements and performance characteristics of Virginia-class submarines to someone he believed was a representative of a foreign government but who was actually an undercover FBI agent.

Diana Toebbe, who was teaching at a private school in Maryland at the time of the couple’s arrest last October, was accused of acting as a lookout at several prearranged “dead-drop” locations at which memory cards containing the secret information were left behind.

The memory cards were devices concealed in objects such as a chewing gum wrapper and a peanut butter sandwich. The couple was arrested after he placed a memory card at a dead drop location in Jefferson County, West Virginia.

None of the information was classified as top secret or secret, falling into a third category considered confidential, according to testimony Tuesday.

The FBI has said the scheme began in April 2020, when Jonathan Toebbe sent a package of Navy documents to a foreign government and wrote that he was interested in selling to that country operations manuals, performance reports and other sensitive information. He included in the package, which had a Pittsburgh return address, instructions to his supposed contact for how to establish a covert relationship with him, prosecutors said.

That package was obtained by the FBI in December 2020 through its legal attaché office in the unspecified foreign country. That set off a monthslong undercover operation in which an agent posing as a representative of a foreign country made contact with Toebbe, ultimately paying $100,000 in cryptocurrency in exchange for the information Toebbe was offering.

Jonathan Toebbe, who held a top-secret security clearance through the Defense Department, had agreed as part of the plea deal to help federal officials with locating and retrieving all classified information in his possession, as well as the cryptocurrency paid to him.

The country to which Jonathan Toebbe was looking to sell the information has not been identified in court documents and was not disclosed in court.

FBI agents who searched the couple’s home found a trash bag of shredded documents, thousands of dollars in cash, valid children’s passports and a “go-bag” containing a USB flash drive and latex gloves, according to court testimony last year.

During a December 2021 hearing, Diana Toebbe’s lawyers denied prosecution assertions that cited 2019 messages exchanged by the couple in which she had contemplated fleeing the United States to avoid arrest. Instead, the defense said it was contempt for then-President Donald Trump as the reason behind the couple’s emigration plans.

Jamie Lynn Ferguson was arrested last week in Lynchburg, Virginia, and is scheduled for an initial appearance Tuesday before a U.S. magistrate judge in Washington, D.C., according to a criminal complaint.

Ferguson was charged with entering and remaining in a restricted building, disorderly and disruptive conduct in a restricted building, disorderly conduct in a Capitol building, and parading, demonstrating or picketing in a Capitol building, the complaint said.

Ferguson is a technical sergeant and a part-time, drill status guardsman assigned to the West Virginia Air National Guard, Guard spokeswoman Maj. Holli Nelson said in a statement.

“As a matter of policy, the 130th Airlift Wing and the West Virginia National Guard do not comment on pending criminal charges,” the statement said.

A federal public defender listed for Ferguson did not immediately return a telephone message seeking comment on her behalf Monday.

On Jan. 14, 2021, the U.S. Air Force Office of Special Investigations submitted an investigative report to the FBI about Ferguson’s suspected involvement at the Capitol. The report provided her photograph and biographical information along with social media posts and screenshots of a video allegedly showing her inside the Capitol Rotunda on Jan. 6.

Ferguson was on leave from Jan. 5 to Jan. 7. Her destination was listed as Washington, D.C., according to the OSI report.

On Jan. 3, 2021, the woman’s Facebook account had shared an article with a picture of a crowd in front of the Capitol with a storm cloud and Mount Rushmore above it. A caption in the woman’s post read, “I pray this is exactly what D.C. will look like on Jan. 6th. #HoldTheLine.” A comment on the post asked whether the woman was going to the Capitol and she replied, “I am,” according to a statement of facts filed by an FBI special agent.

Video footage obtained by Capitol police shows a woman with long dark hair wearing a dark hooded sweatshirt with the phrase “Yes, I’m a Trump Girl” in white lettering and carrying a backpack entered the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, according to the statement.

On Jan. 14, 2021, Ferguson was interviewed at her home by FBI agents and provided cellphone photos and videos from Jan. 5 to Jan. 7, 2021. One of the photos shows her physical appearance and clothing appearing to match the woman depicted in the video and news photos at the Capitol, the statement said.

Ferguson told the agents she attended a rally in support of then-President Donald Trump with her parents, who left afterward. Ferguson said she proceeded to the Capitol, believing she would be able to see Trump again, the statement said. She said she remained in the Rotunda area for about 40 minutes.

Court documents list Ferguson’s birth year as 1977 but redacted her month and date. Under the conditions of her release, Ferguson was ordered to stay at the Virginia home of her parents.

Diana Toebbe entered the plea in federal court in Martinsburg to one count of conspiracy to communicate restricted data. Prosecutors said they would seek a prison term of up to three years at sentencing.

Her husband, Jonathan, a Navy nuclear engineer, pleaded guilty Monday to passing information about American nuclear-powered warships to someone he thought was a representative of a foreign government but who was actually an undercover FBI agent.

Diana Toebbe was charged with acting as a lookout at several prearranged “dead-drop” locations at which memory cards containing the secret information were left behind. At the time of her arrest, Diana Toebbe was teaching at a private school in Maryland.

In pleading guilty to the same charge as his wife, Jonathan Toebbe, 43, faces a potential punishment between roughly 12 and 17 years in prison, a sentencing range agreed to be lawyers.

Prosecutors said he abused his access to top-secret government information and repeatedly sold details about the design elements and performance characteristics of Virginia-class submarines.

Jonathan Toebbe acknowledged during his plea hearing that he conspired with his wife to pass classified information to a foreign government in exchange for money with the intent to “injure the United States.”

The memory cards were devices concealed in objects such as a chewing gum wrapper and a peanut butter sandwich. The Annapolis, Maryland, couple was arrested on Oct. 9 after he placed a memory card at a dead drop location in Jefferson County, West Virginia.

The FBI has said the scheme began in April 2020, when Jonathan Toebbe sent a package of Navy documents to a foreign government and wrote that he was interested in selling to that country operations manuals, performance reports and other sensitive information. He included in the package, which had a Pittsburgh return address, instructions to his supposed contact for how to establish a covert relationship with him, prosecutors said.

That package was obtained by the FBI in December 2020 through its legal attaché office in the unspecified foreign country. That set off a monthslong undercover operation in which an agent posing as a representative of a foreign country made contact with Toebbe, ultimately paying $100,000 in cryptocurrency in exchange for the information Toebbe was offering.

The country to which Jonathan Toebbe was looking to sell the information has not been identified in court documents and was not disclosed in court during his wife’s plea hearing Friday.

Jonathan Toebbe, who held a top-secret security clearance through the Defense Department, agreed as part of the plea deal to help federal officials with locating and retrieving all classified information in his possession, as well as the roughly $100,000 in cryptocurrency paid to him by the FBI.

FBI agents who searched the couple’s home found a trash bag of shredded documents, thousands of dollars in cash, valid children’s passports and a “go-bag” containing a USB flash drive and latex gloves, according to court testimony last year.

During a December hearing, Diana Toebbe’s lawyers denied prosecution assertions that cited 2019 messages exchanged by the couple in which she had contemplated fleeing the United States to avoid arrest. Instead, the defense said it was contempt for then-President Donald Trump as the reason behind the couple’s emigration plans.

Mays pleaded guilty last year to intentionally killing the patients with wrongful insulin injections at the Louis A. Johnson VA Medical Center in Clarksburg. She faces up to life in prison for each of seven counts of second-degree murder when she is sentenced Tuesday in federal court.

Mays, 46, of Reynoldsville, admitted at a July plea hearing to injecting the veterans with unprescribed insulin while she worked overnight shifts at the northern West Virginia hospital between 2017 and 2018. Hospital officials reported the deaths to the VA inspector general and fired Mays.

The motive of Mays, who served in the Army National Guard in a noncombat position in Iraq and Afghanistan, is still unclear. Then-U.S. Attorney Bill Powell had said authorities did not receive a “satisfactory response” to questions about the reasoning behind her actions.

Among Mays’ duties included measuring patients’ vital signs and blood glucose levels. VA nursing assistants are not qualified or authorized to administer medication, including insulin, prosecutors said. The hospital’s nursing assistants also were not required to have a certificate or license as a condition of continuing employment.

Powell said there were about 20 suspicious deaths at the medical center during the time Mays worked there, but charges were only brought in cases where the government thought it had sufficient evidence.

Some family members are expected to make statements during the sentencing hearing.

The second-degree murder charges involved the deaths of Army veterans Robert Lee Kozul Sr., 89, Archie D. Edgell, 84, Felix Kirk McDermott, 82, and a 96-year-old man identified only by his initials, W.A.H.; Navy veteran Robert Edge Sr., 82; Air Force veteran George Nelson Shaw Sr., 81; and Army and Air Force veteran Raymond Golden, 88.

It’s not clear whether Mays admitted a connection to the death of Navy veteran Russell R. Posey Sr., 92. But in addition to her other pleas, she also pleaded guilty to one count of assault with intent to commit murder involving the death of “veteran R.R.P.” — Posey’s initials. She faces up to 20 additional years on that count.

Separately, the federal government has agreed to the settlement of numerous lawsuits filed by veterans’ families alleging a widespread system of failures at the hospital.

The VA is responsible for 9 million military veterans. The agency’s former director was fired in 2018 in the wake of a bruising ethics scandal and a mounting rebellion within the agency. Robert Wilkie took over as Veterans Affairs secretary in July 2018.

Elizabeth Jo Shirley, 47, pleaded guilty last year as part of a plea agreement to one count each of willful retention of national defense information and international parental kidnapping.

“Shirley held a position that required the highest level of trust,” U.S. Attorney Bill Powell of West Virginia’s northern district said in a statement. “When she committed these crimes, she not only broke that trust, she potentially endangered the very people who employed her and her neighbors. National security is one of our highest priorities. Shirley deserves her sentence and not a day less.”

Prosecutors said Shirley, of Hedgesville, leased a storage unit and kept a document — without authorization — relating to national defense that outlines intelligence information regarding a foreign government’s military and political issues.

Shirley worked on assignments with the NSA while serving in the Air Force.

From 2001 to 2012, Shirley held various positions with the Navy’s Office of Naval Intelligence, the departments of Defense and Energy, the National Cyber Investigative Joint Task Force and at least five different cleared defense contractors. She also held top-level security clearances at various times, the statement said.

Shirley took her 6-year-old daughter to Mexico in July 2019 after she failed to return the child on the agreed-upon date to the girl’s custodial father, the primary residential parent, and his wife in West Virginia.

Prosecutors said Shirley went to Mexico with the intent of contacting Russian government representatives to request resettlement in a country that would not extradite her back to the U.S.

While in Mexico, Shirley prepared a written message that referenced an “urgent need” to have items shipped from the U.S. related to her “life’s work before they are seized and destroyed,” prosecutors said.

Shirley was arrested in August 2019 at a hotel in Mexico City and the girl was returned to her father. Authorities said the NSA document was located that month in a storage locker in Martinsburg, while messages Shirley had drafted to Russian government officials along with other classified information were found on her electronic devices.

“Shirley betrayed the trust of the American people when she took classified information from her work with the intelligence community,” said Assistant Attorney General John C. Demers of the National Security Division. “She then sought to profit from her betrayal by seeking to sell this information to Russia, one of America’s foremost adversaries, in order to further her criminal abduction of her daughter.

“This sentence will hold Shirley accountable for her violations of the American people’s trust, and serves as a warning to others who would seek unlawful profit at America’s expense.”