WASHINGTON — A Pentagon contractor arrested for allegedly taking classified intelligence — including some sensitive materials about a foreign country — and hoarding it at his Maryland home will remain in custody for the time being, according to a report.
US District Chief Judge George Levi Russell III ordered the alleged leaker Aurelio Luis Perez-Lugones to remain in custody after one of his defense attorneys acknowledged they weren’t “prepared to move forward” with the hearing in a Baltimore federal courtroom, Politico reported.
The IT specialist and former US Navy service member was identified as an alleged leaker in a criminal complaint unsealed Wednesday, following an FBI raid on the home of a Washington Post reporter who has promoted herself as “the federal government whisperer.”
Washington Post journalist Hannah Natanson’s home in suburban Alexandria, Va., was searched by the FBI as part of an investigation into a government contractor accused of retaining national defense information unlawfully, sources told her outlet.
Agents seized her phone, a personal laptop, a work laptop and a Garmin watch, the outlet noted.
Officials have not said whether Perez-Lugones had in fact leaked information to Natanson.
“We can’t talk,” said a man who later answered the door of Natanson’s home — and matches the appearance of a man in her X account’s banner picture — when The Post came knocking Wednesday.
Natanson wrote in her personal piece about reporting on President Trump’s attempts to downsize the DC bureaucracy that 1,169 new sources reached out to her.
On Wednesday, the president told reporters: “The leaker has been found and is in jail right now — and that’s the leaker on Venezuela. A very bad leaker.”
Perez-Lugones has been detained since agents also executed a search warrant on his Laurel, Md., residence on Jan. 8 and found “multiple documents that were marked SECRET,” according to the complaint, which was filed the day after.
“The Trump Administration will not tolerate illegal leaks of classified information that, when reported, pose a grave risk to our Nation’s national security and the brave men and women who are serving our country,” Attorney General Pam Bondi added in a statement Wednesday.
Federal prosecutors had been seeking to detain him pending charges because he “poses a danger to the community,” court filings show.
“The Defendant has held a security clearance for over 25 years and the Government cannot ensure the safety of the country and US military personnel without detention,” prosecutors wrote in a Jan. 13 filing.
“Only detention would provide the government a way to monitor whether the Defendant uses any of his knowledge to threaten national security.”
A magistrate judge had initially drafted terms of conditional release.
An affidavit accompanying the complaint alleged he had unlawfully retained national defense information — a count that could earn him up to 10 years in federal prison.
As a systems engineer at a government contractor in Maryland, Perez-Lugones holds a top-secret security clearance and allegedly printed out screenshots of “a classified intelligence report related to a foreign country” on Oct. 28, 2025, an FBI special agent wrote in an affidavit appended to the complaint.
The government contractor also took notes on a yellow legal pad that he stashed in a black bag and took home between Jan. 5 and 7, alleged the affidavit.
Perez-Lugones’ public defenders Francisco Carriedo and Courtney Francik did not respond to requests for comment.
In a statement following the search of Natanson’s residence, Washington Post publisher Will Lewis put out a statement: “Hannah is one of our finest reporters, who works tirelessly to inform our readers about what is actually happening in government.”
“Unsurprisingly, her spirit is not dimmed by the outrageous action that was taken against her at 6am this morning at her home,” Lewis said.
“Even with her laptops and phone taken, what did she most want to do today? Get back to work and file some new hard-hitting stories — thus exemplifying the indomitable spirit of The Washington Post. After all, this is what we do.”
The paper has a venerable history of standing up for journalists reporting on sensitive US defense information; most notably through the reporting of the Pentagon Papers about the Vietnam War.
The FBI under then-President Richard Nixon investigated the Washington Post journalist Ben Bagdikian for writing about the leaked classified records on American involvement in the Southeast Asian country.
