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Reality Winner Sentenced To 63 Months In Federal Prison
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The Georgia woman who leaked classified National Security Agency documents to the media has been sentenced to 63 months behind bars.
Prosecutors call it the longest federal sentence ever for that type of crime.
Federal prosecutors charged 26-year-old Winner last summer with violating the Espionage Act. Court documents show Winner used her security clearance to smuggle out a classified document that was later used as part of a story in The Intercept.
That story detailed Russian cyberattacks and spear-fishing attempts on elections officials ahead of the 2016 election.
The Intercept Editor-In-Chief Betsy Reed released a statement Thursday saying in part: "The information in The Intercept story on the NSA report played a crucial role in alerting local election officials who had been in the dark about the cyberattack — a public service that was implicitly acknowledged in a recent report from the Senate Intelligence Committee," and that Winner should be "honored, not punished."
In late June, Winner took a plea deal after spending more than a year in prison without bond.
In a statement earlier this year, Winner's mother, Billie Winner-Davis, said a plea deal was "the only way that she could receive a fair sentence."
Winner was the first person charged under the Trump administration's crackdown on government leakers.
A former FBI agent in Minnesota admitted to leaking classified information that also appeared in stories by The Intercept.
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