As previously reported, State Department contractor stole thousands of pages of “TOP SECRET” classified documents and met with Beijing officials.
Ashley Tellis, an expert on India and South Asian affairs, removed the top secret documents from secure locations and met with Chinese officials.
The classified documents were located in Tellis’s Virginia home during a raid.
“On Sept. 25, he allegedly printed U.S. Air Force documents concerning military aircraft capabilities. Federal prosecutors allege that he met with Chinese government officials multiple times over the past several years,” Fox News reported.
Prosecutors said in September 2022 that Tellis brought a manila envelope with him when he met with Chinese officials in a Virginia restaurant.
Tellis has been in jail since October 11.
He was charged with one count of retaining national defense information.
Tellis’ attorneys insist their client did not disclose any classified information to a foreign government and claimed government investigators are interpreting his “routine professional duties” as something sinister.
“Regrettably, investigators appeared to interpret his routine professional duties, such as liaison work and international travel, as clandestine activity, reading something sinister into what were standard think-tank and scholarly foreign policy engagements,” Tellis’ attorneys wrote in a court filing, according to The Washington Post.
Newly sworn in US Attorney Lindsey Halligan charged Tellis.
Trump U.S. Attorney Lindsey Halligan is already firing on all cylinders.
Over the last several weeks, she charged two leading Lawfare Democrats.
This week, she charged a Chinese spy.
And she’s just getting started. https://t.co/Afsd3yf33N
— Mike Davis (@mrddmia) October 14, 2025
Government prosecutors said Tellis is cooperating with investigators so he was released to home confinement.
“A federal magistrate judge granted a joint request from prosecutors and Tellis’s attorneys for home confinement pending trial. Tellis had been in jail since his arrest Oct. 11,” the Washington Post reported.
“For those entrusted with our country’s most sensitive information, protecting it is a privilege and solemn responsibility,” Sue J. Bai, a top prosecutor in the Justice Department’s National Security Division, said in a statement Tuesday, according to The Washington Post.
“With the hard work and dedication of our prosecutors and agents, we will hold this defendant accountable for breaching that trust and exploiting his security clearance to unlawfully retain classified information detailing our military capabilities.”
“Tellis will be meeting for the first time with prosecutors and FBI officials on Nov. 4 to discuss “possible resolutions of the case, including any potential resolution prior to indictment,” according to court records. U.S. District Judge Leonie M. Brinkema agreed to extend to two months the usual one-month deadline to obtain an indictment after an arrest as negotiations continue, according to a court order,” The Post reported.
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