Army Veteran Charged With Disclosing Classified Delta Force Tactics

An Army veteran who helped support the elite Delta Force commando unit has been arrested on a charge that she shared classified information with a journalist writing about the secretive team.

Courtney Williams, 40, appeared Wednesday in federal court in Raleigh, North Carolina, to face a criminal complaint of unlawful transmission of national defense information.

The complaint asserts that Williams disclosed “tactics, techniques and procedures” used by an unspecified “special military unit” based at Fort Bragg. Those details were classified “secret” and barred from distribution to foreign countries, prosecutors allege.

An affidavit from an FBI agent supporting the criminal case doesn’t name the unit or the reporter, but details provided in the court document match a book by author Seth Harp about Delta Force last year as well as an adaptation that appeared in POLITICO.

Harp said Williams endured years of “vicious harassment” of a sexual nature while working to provide special operations troops with passports, drivers licenses and credit cards that allowed them to deploy abroad while avoiding detection. She eventually filed a formal complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and reached a settlement, according to the author.

Harp said Williams is being unfairly accused.

“Courtney Williams is a veteran, a mother, and a patriotic American. She has committed no crime. Trump's unhinged DOJ will not even say what ‘classified information’ she allegedly leaked. Her arrest and imprisonment is an outrage,” Harp wrote on X. “Is it classified that many Delta Force operators and officers sexually harass and discriminate against women in the workplace?”

FBI Director Kash Patel hailed Williams’ arrest and what he called the “outstanding work” that led to it.

“FBI and our partners have arrested a former SOCOM employee, who supported our top-level military warfighters, for allegedly transmitting classified information to a member of the media,” Patel wrote on X. “Let this serve as a message to any would-be leakers: we’re working these cases, and we’re making arrests. This FBI will not tolerate those who seek to betray our country and put Americans in harm’s way.”

Harp, however, said the case required little sleuthing on the FBI’s part. Williams is mentioned by name throughout the book and the POLITICO article, which included four photos of her. “We never made any attempt to hide that or disguise her identity,” he said.

A POLITICO spokesperson declined to comment.

The criminal complaint alleges that shortly after the book was published Williams expressed concern to Harp via text, writing that she “would definitely have been concerned with the amount of classified information that was disclosed” and that she feared it gave the authorities “a chance to legally persecute me.”

The preliminary charge against Williams carries a maximum possible penalty of 10 years in prison. She was represented by a federal defender at the brief hearing Wednesday, but court records indicate Williams is planning to retain a private attorney to represent her.

Prosecutors have requested that Williams be detained pending trial. A magistrate judge set a hearing for Monday on that request and ordered that Williams be held until then.