Abraham Teklu Lemma, a former US government information technology contractor with Top Secret clearance, has pleaded guilty to conspiring to transmit national defense information to Ethiopian government officials. The Justice Department said Lemma admitted removing and sharing highly classified material during a scheme that ran from 2021 until his arrest in August 2023. The department announced the plea on November 3.
Lemma, 53, of Maryland, previously worked as an IT contractor for the National Reconnaissance Office, the State Department and the Justice Department. According to court documents cited by prosecutors, he used his access as an IT administrator to collect documents, notes, photographs and other materials classified as high as Top Secret/Sensitive Compartmented Information, then removed the information from secure government facilities.
Much of the material concerned the armed conflict in Ethiopia, the Justice Department said. Lemma’s alleged co-conspirators included senior officials in Ethiopia’s political, military and intelligence branches. Prosecutors said that, in some communications, he encouraged officials to act against paramilitary groups fighting the Ethiopian government, including a December 2021 message stating, “We have to finish these people once and for all,” followed later that day by a request to “send Dro[nes].”
The case illustrates the security risk created when privileged technical access intersects with classified-information clearance. The Justice Department said Lemma wrote down classified information and carried the notes out of secure facilities, while also removing electronic copies from classified repositories. FBI Assistant Director Roman Rozhavsky said Ethiopian officials later used information supplied by Lemma in military operations during the conflict.
Lemma pleaded guilty to conspiracy to transmit national defense information to a foreign government. Under the plea agreement, he has agreed to a prison term of between 120 and 262 months, subject to the court’s acceptance of the agreement. Sentencing is scheduled for April 14, 2027. The FBI Washington Field Office investigated the case, which was prosecuted by the Justice Department’s National Security Division and the US Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia.