REPORTING TO YOU

THE SECRET CIA FILES

CIA Files Say Staffers Committed Sex

Crimes Involving Children. They Weren’t
Prosecuted.
Declassified CIA inspector general reports show a pattern of abuse and a repeated decision by federal
prosecutors not to hold agency personnel accountable.
Jason Leopold
BuzzFeed News Reporter

Anthony Cormier
BuzzFeed News Reporter

Posted on December 1, 2021, at 4:25 p.m. ET

Anthony Gerace for BuzzFeed News

Over the past 14 years, the Central Intelligence Agency has secretly amassed credible evidence that at
least 10 of its employees and contractors committed sexual crimes involving children.

Though most of these cases were referred to US attorneys for prosecution, only one of the individuals
was ever charged with a crime. Prosecutors sent the rest of the cases back to the CIA to handle internally,
CIA Files Say Staffers Committed Sex Crimes Involving Children. They Weren’t Prosecuted.
meaning few faced any consequences beyond the possible loss of their jobs and security clearances. That
marks a striking deviation from how sex crimes involving children have been handled at other federal
agencies such as the Department of Homeland Security and the Drug Enforcement Administration. CIA
insiders say the agency resists prosecution of its staff for fear the cases will reveal state secrets.

The revelations are contained in hundreds of internal agency reports obtained by BuzzFeed News
through Freedom of Information Act lawsuits.

One employee had sexual contact with a 2-year-old and a 6-year-old. He was fired. A second employee
purchased three sexually explicit videos of young girls, filmed by their mothers. He resigned. A third
employee estimated that he had viewed up to 1,400 sexually abusive images of children while on agency
assignments. The records do not say what action, if any, the CIA took against him. A contractor who
arranged for sex with an undercover FBI agent posing as a child had his contract revoked.

Only one of the individuals cited in these documents was charged with a crime. In that case, as in the
only previously known case of a CIA staffer being charged with child sexual crimes, the employee was
also under investigation for mishandling classified material.

Got a tip? You can email The CIA did not answer detailed questions, saying only that
tips@buzzfeed.com. To learn the agency “takes all allegations of possible criminal
how to reach us securely, go to misconduct committed by personnel seriously.”
tips.buzzfeed.com.
A spokesperson for the Eastern District of Virginia, where
many of the criminal referrals were sent, also did not answer detailed questions, saying the district
“takes seriously its responsibility to hold accountable federal government employees who violate federal
law within our jurisdiction.”

Four former officials who are familiar with how internal investigations work at intelligence agencies told
BuzzFeed News there are many reasons that prosecutors might not pursue a criminal case. One of them,
familiar with the workings of the CIA’s Office of the Inspector General, said the agency is concerned that
in a criminal case, it could lose control of sensitive information.

The former official, who reviewed the declassified inspector general reports, characterized the concern
from CIA lawyers as, “We can’t have these people testify, they may inadvertently be forced to disclose
sources and methods.”

The official, who noted the agency has had a problem with child abuse images stretching back decades,
said they understand the need to protect “sensitive and classified equities.” However, “for crimes of a
certain class whether it’s an intelligence agency or not, you just have to figure out how to prosecute
these people.”

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Sexual crimes involving children, including the viewing of images of abuse, have been uncovered at other
agencies that handle sensitive information. In a November 2009 report, the Department of Defense
acknowledged that dozens of Pentagon staff members or contractors had such images. In 2014, the
Inspector General of the Intelligence Community found that two officials from the National
Reconnaissance Office, which oversees America’s spy satellites, acknowledged viewing images of child
sexual abuse during polygraph examinations.
CIA Files Say Staffers Committed Sex Crimes Involving Children. They Weren’t Prosecuted.
At a symposium in 2016, Daniel Payne, a top Pentagon security official, said that when workers’
computers were examined, “the amount of child porn I see is just unbelievable.”

CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia

Olivier Doulier / Pool / Getty Images

The child abuse revelations are drawn from an unprecedented release of reports by the CIA’s Office of
the Inspector General.

BuzzFeed News gained access to these documents after a decadelong pursuit, which included 13 public
records requests and three separate Freedom of Information Act lawsuits.

Those requests, the earliest of which date back to 2012, were for investigations closed by the Office of the
Inspector General, which acts independently of the agency to examine misconduct by employees or
contractors.

New requests were filed each subsequent year. At first the CIA did not respond to the requests; then, it
said it would take years to provide any documents. Those requests were followed in 2014, 2015, and 2020
by lawsuits, and the agency entered into negotiations about what documents to release. The coronavirus
pandemic delayed the process by a year, but the agency finally began to release the documents in March
and will release the final set in December.

BuzzFeed News is publishing the reports here for public review.

Among more than 3,000 pages, covering the years 2004 to 2019, are investigations big and small
involving billing irregularities by contractors, a spy who expensed a visit to an overseas “gentleman’s
club,” and an employee who used government computer systems to resell more than 700 items
purchased at yard sales.
CIA Files Say Staffers Committed Sex Crimes Involving Children. They Weren’t Prosecuted.
Other reports have been the subject of previous news coverage, such as the CIA’s involvement in the
production of the film Zero Dark Thirty, the torture of detainees held at black site prisons, and a decades-
old operation in Peru that led to the death of missionaries.

More recent reports show that a CIA employee was investigated in October 2018 for using agency
computer systems and databases to conduct “unofficial searches” on her brother, and that the inspector
general substantiated allegations in a January 2018 memorandum that another CIA employee violated
the Hatch Act, which limits political activity by civil servants in the executive branch.

The documents also reveal the pattern of sexual abuse cases, whereby internal investigators unearthed
evidence of sexual crimes involving children but federal prosecutors brought no charges.

As is typical of intelligence documents, the records have been heavily redacted. Among the information
that has been hidden are the names of the accused employees and contractors and details about their
jobs at the CIA. The agency cites privacy reasons, national security, and a federal law that exempts the
CIA from disclosing details about its operations.

A heavily redacted report from the CIA inspector general

Obtained via FOIA

“Not knowing the identities of the suspects is a hindrance in identifying these cases and why they were
declined,” the spokesperson for the Eastern District of Virginia said.

Of the 10 workers who the inspector general found had committed sexual crimes involving children, five
were fired or resigned. Four others were referred to a personnel board or the Office of Security, which
investigates classified leaks and is responsible for the safety of CIA facilities.

The outcome of one case — in which 10 child sexual abuse images were discovered on a CIA computer
that had been left unattended — is unknown. The employee to whom that device was assigned said he
switched computers while he was overseas. He denied using it to view such material.

CIA Files Say Staffers Committed Sex Crimes Involving Children. They Weren’t Prosecuted.
In an eleventh case, the inspector general received a complaint in November 2016 that an employee used
a government computer to view child sexual abuse images. Although the investigators couldn’t
corroborate the allegation, they discovered that he had shown a “consistent interest and pattern of
[redacted] conversations involving sexual activities between adults and minors.”

The inspector general alerted security officials and the Directorate of Science and Technology because
the accusation raised “potential security and accountability issues.” Details of how the case was resolved,
and any penalties the employee faced, are redacted.

Beyond the CIA’s handling of these cases, questions linger over why US attorneys chose not to charge
anyone, even when they seemed to have significant evidence.

Prosecutors generally have wide discretion over whether to bring criminal charges. They can judge the
evidence too old or weak, consider a crime victim’s desire to proceed with prosecution, and weigh the
chances of convincing a jury.

“The occupation or employer of the suspect does not factor into that evaluation,” the spokesperson for
the US Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia said. “While we cannot comment on the
reasons why specific cases were declined, we do take very seriously any allegation that our prosecutors
declined a potential case based on an improper assessment of the relevant factors.”

It appears that at least half of the sexual abuse investigations originated with a confession. The
documents do not spell out the circumstances surrounding those statements, or whether they emerged
during grueling “full-scope” polygraph examinations that can probe every part of CIA employees’ and
contractors’ lives.

During those screenings, one former intelligence official told BuzzFeed News, it is not uncommon for a
candidate to admit unlawful behavior in order to prove they aren’t lying — only later to realize that their
statement might have sunk their chance to work for the agency and even put them in legal jeopardy.

Such statements are sent to the inspector general, which then tries to collect evidence proving the crime
occurred. But that gives the subject time to delete or destroy evidence, said the former official.

That’s what happened in January 2010, when a CIA contractor logged into a chatroom using an agency IP
address and solicited sex from an FBI agent posing as a child. The contractor acknowledged an obsession
with child sexual abuse images, but by the time the inspector general obtained a search warrant and
seized the man’s computer, someone had “removed the hard drives and thrown them away,” according to
the reports.

CIA Files Say Staffers Committed Sex Crimes Involving Children. They Weren’t Prosecuted.
Obtained via FOIA

Obtained via FOIA

Another CIA employee signed an affidavit admitting he used a government laptop to view photographs
and videos of girls as young as 10 being abused by an “older guy.”

The employee acknowledged that he first began seeking child sexual abuse images while he was in
college, and viewed as many as 1,400 while on assignment for the agency. He told CIA investigators that
he was “truly sorry” but also said “he did not understand that it was a violation of agency policy to
access child pornography until he took the Agency Information Security Course.”

When the inspector general examined the man’s computers, however, no such images were visible. A
federal prosecutor declined to charge the man in “favor of administrative action” by the CIA. The
personnel board’s recommendation is redacted.

But in several of the cases, prosecutors had plenty to go on.

During an investigation that ended in August 2009, an official with a security clearance acknowledged
having sexual contact with two girls, ages 2 and 6, and downloading illicit images while working for the
CIA. The inspector general started a broad inquiry and attempted to identify the victims.

Obtained via FOIA

The investigators found that he had “extensively” downloaded abuse material, such as 63 videos of
children between 8 and 16. The man regularly used government Wi-Fi to download the material, he
distributed it to others, and he brought the photos back into the US after he returned from a trip
overseas.

CIA Files Say Staffers Committed Sex Crimes Involving Children. They Weren’t Prosecuted.
Despite the admissions and the evidence that investigators found on his devices, prosecutors from the
Eastern District of Virginia declined to take up a criminal case. They told the inspector general there
were “taint issues,” a term that is sometimes used to refer to mishandled evidence. The attorneys also
said that the girls in those videos had not been “previously identified child pornography victims,”
making it harder to prove they were minors.

Obtained via FOIA

By contrast, in the only two cases known to have led to criminal charges, both parties were also accused
of serious offenses related to classified information.

According to an Aug. 6, 2013, inspector general report, an investigation into a CIA contractor suspected
of being in possession of child sexual abuse images turned up classified material stored on his personal
hard drive and “numerous technical documents related to the Agency's systems” on his laptop. The
contractor was fired and stripped of his security clearance. He later pleaded guilty to the child abuse
charges and registered as a sex offender. The report says the contractor was sentenced, but the details,
along with his name, were redacted.

In the other case, CIA software engineer Joshua Schulte was charged in 2018 with possession of child
sexual abuse images as part of a much larger investigation into the largest leak of classified information
in the agency’s history. Known as Vault 7 and published by WikiLeaks, the trove of documents revealed
secret tools that the CIA used to hack into computers. It was prosecuted under the Espionage Act.

Schulte faces a separate trial on the child sexual abuse charges. He has pleaded not guilty. ●

Read the CIA inspector general reports on child abuse

CIA Files Say Staffers Committed Sex Crimes Involving Children. They Weren’t Prosecuted.
 LEOPOLD CIA IG FOIA Child Abuse Contributed by Jason Leopold (Jason Leopold Investigations)

Document 1 of 75 100%

Read the hundreds of reports from the CIA inspector general obtained by BuzzFeed News
CIA Files Say Staffers Committed Sex Crimes Involving Children. They Weren’t Prosecuted.
LEOPOLD FOIA CIA IG Reports Collected Contributed by Jason Leopold (Jason Leopold Investigations)

Document 1 of 3652 100%

Jason Leopold is a senior investigative

CIA Files reporter for
Say Staffers Anthony
Committed Sex Cormier
Crimes is an investigative
Involving Children. reporter for BuzzFeed
They Weren’t Prosecuted.
BuzzFeed News and is based in Los Angeles. He is a 2018 News and is based in New York. While working for the
 Tampa Bay Times, Cormier won the 2016 Pulitzer Prize
Pulitzer finalist for international reporting, recipient of the for Investigative Reporting.
IRE 2016 FOI award and a 2016 Newseum Institute
Contact Anthony Cormier at
National Freedom of Information Hall of Fame inductee.
anthony.cormier@buzzfeed.com.
Contact Jason Leopold at jason.leopold@buzzfeed.com.

Got a confidential tip? Submit it here.

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