A federal grand jury has indicted a former U.S. Army employee on charges of disclosing classified information to a journalist, the Justice Department announced Wednesday.
Courtney Williams, 40, of North Carolina, was arrested by FBI agents on Tuesday, the department said. She faces charges related to transmitting national defense information to a member of the media, though the Justice Department did not identify the journalist by name.
U.S. media outlets identified the journalist as Seth Harp, author of the 2025 book “The Fort Bragg Cartel: Drug Trafficking and Murder in the Special Forces.”
According to court documents, Williams worked for a special military unit at Fort Bragg, headquarters of the U.S. Army’s elite Special Operations Command, between 2010 and 2016. During that time, she held a top-secret security clearance. She was quoted by name in Harp’s book.
Prosecutors allege Williams communicated with the journalist by telephone and text message on numerous occasions between 2022 and 2025.
“Courtney Williams swore an oath to safeguard our nation’s secrets as an employee supporting a special military unit of the Army,” said Roman Rozhavsky, assistant director of the FBI’s Counterintelligence and Espionage Division. “She allegedly betrayed that oath by sharing classified information with a media outlet and putting our nation, our warfighters, and our allies at risk.”
WRAL-TV reported the book details sexual harassment and discrimination experiences that Williams said she endured during her years at Fort Bragg.
Following the book’s publication, Williams allegedly exchanged messages with the author in which she said she was “concerned about the amount of classified information being disclosed,” the Justice Department said.
In a separate message to a third party, she allegedly expressed concern that she was “probably going to jail for life.”
