A Defense Department contractor has been arrested and charged after allegedly taking scores of pages of highly classified government documents that he had printed at work.
Gokhan Gun, an electrical engineer who works with the Air Force, was about to leave his Virginia home Friday for the airport to catch a flight to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, when he was apprehended by authorities, according to court filings.
Gun, who holds dual Turkish and American citizenship, has a top-secret clearance but is not authorized to take any classified documents home, according to an 11-page complaint filed in a Virginia federal court.
He was charged with one count of unauthorized removal and retention of classified material. If convicted he faces up to five years in prison and a $250,000 fine.
Appearing in court on Friday, Gun told the judge: "This is a surprise, Sir."
His next hearing is scheduled for Tuesday. He'll remain in jail until then, the Washington Post reported.
His public defender argued that Gun wasn't a flight risk and was headed to Mexico for a fishing trip.
Federal agents, who surprised Gun at his home with a search warrant just as he was leaving for his trip, discovered a "stack of pages" that included documents with "visible classification markings," including "top secret" and "sensitive compartmented information," an FBI agent said in a court filing.
Authorities believe he began printing out the pages in May through last week. Gun was allegedly seen leaving the office with "rolled papers" in a translucent shopping bag and later in a red shopping bag.
He traveled with them to his home in Fairfax, Virginia, used two cell phones, and then went to his second residence in Falls Church, according to the FBI court filing.
Gun is a frequent traveler who has taken several trips to Turkey and European and Middle Eastern countries, according to officials. He owns homes in Virginia, Texas and Florida.
In an FBI interview, the contractor denied taking classified materials home, and lables marking any information as classified may have expired.
Gun allegedly printed 406 pages of documents, including 82 marked top secret, earlier this week, authorities said.
Investigators have not yet revealed Gun's motive.
Gun's arrest follows several recent high-profile cases involving classified documents.
