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A former Justice Department prosecutor was charged Wednesday with allegedly emailing confidential records tied to former special counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into President Donald Trump.
Carmen Mercedes Lineberger, 62, of Port St. Lucie, Florida, faces four criminal charges stemming from her handling of Smith’s final report: one felony count of obstruction of justice, one felony count of concealing government records and two misdemeanor counts of theft of government property valued at less than $1,000.
According to the indictment filed in the Southern District of Florida, Lineberger allegedly altered electronic file names of government records to conceal unauthorized transmissions of the documents to her personal email accounts.
At the time, she was serving as the Managing Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Fort Pierce branch of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida.
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Jack Smith, former special counsel, arrives for a closed-door deposition before the House Judiciary Committee in Washington, D.C., on Dec. 17, 2025. (Getty Images)
U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon previously blocked the public release of the volume of Smith’s report related to the classified documents investigation involving Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in January 2025.
FBI Director Kash Patel announced the charges in a post on X.
“This afternoon, a former managing assistant U.S. Attorney who supported Jack Smith’s politicized investigation of President Trump has been charged with stealing the confidential investigation documents,” Patel wrote. “Carmen Lineberger allegedly emailed the confidential material to her own personal email, disguising them as dessert recipes to conceal them from record searches.”
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