An electrical engineer working with the Air Force is accused of printing over 150 pages of “top secret” government documents before attempting to flee the country for Mexico, according to prosecutors.
Gokhan Gun, 50, was arrested Friday as he was departing for a flight to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. Gun, a northern Virginia resident who was born in Turkey and holds dual citizenship, was charged with unauthorized removal and retention of classified material, according to Fox 5 DC.
On Friday morning, Gun was leaving for the airport when FBI agents executed a search warrant on him and two of his homes. Agents discovered documents marked as “TOP SECRET” inside a backpack in front of his home. They also found stacks of documents in the dining room of his home with visible classification markings, including some marked as Top Secret and SCI, or Sensitive Compartmented Information.
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It is unclear what the contents of the documents were.
Gun told the agents that he was headed to Mexico for what he later claimed was a “fishing trip,” a story investigators called “nonsensical” in court documents. The investigators said “it is unclear how highly classified U.S. Government information would help him in this endeavor.”
According to investigators, Gun on several occasions printed documents as early as May and took them home without authorization.
In August, investigators watched Gun leave his workplace with a bag full of hard copy documents before entering two different residences he owned in Fairfax and Falls Church, Virginia.
Investigators subsequently obtained search warrants for Gun.
Since starting with the Air Force in 2020, Gun has printed around 3,400 pages of classified and non-classified materials. He reportedly transported the documents from the office in rolled-up wads in plastic shopping bags, according to The New York Times.
Last week, Gun printed 406 pages, including 82 marked top secret, according to court documents.
Gun provided “demonstrably false information” in his interview with the FBI, according to court documents, including the claim that he never took any classified documents home and that if they were in his home, the classifications had “expired.”
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Prosecutors have requested that Gun be kept in custody in the U.S. over concerns he is a flight risk, citing his various trips over the years and that his parents still live in Turkey.
Gun faces a maximum penalty of five years in prison and a $250,000 fine if convicted on the charge of unauthorized removal and retention of classified material, and government officials plan to file additional felony charges.
The contractor’s public defender reiterated to the court on Friday the claim that he was heading to Mexico for a fishing trip when arguing that he is not a flight risk.
