The US says the former commander and his wife tried to leak military health information to Russia.

WASHINGTON, Sept 29 (Reuters) – A former U.S. military commander and his narcotics expert wife have been charged with conspiring to leak highly sensitive health care information about military patients to Russia, the Justice Department said on Thursday.

Former Major Jamie Lee Henry, a doctor at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, and his wife, Dr. Anna Gabriel, were charged in federal court in Maryland with conspiracy and misrepresentation of personally identifiable health information. Patients in the army.

Although the indictment refers to Henry by the pronoun “he,” Henry used male pronouns during his first court appearance Thursday, and in media interviews prior to 2015, Henry came out as a transgender woman.

Henry’s attorney, David Little, declined to comment on the lawsuit.

An attorney for Gabriel could not immediately be reached for comment.

After Russian President Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine in February, the couple sought to help the Russian government by providing information to help the Putin regime “gain insight into the health status of individuals associated with the US government and military,” the indictment alleges.

The couple met with a man they believed was a Russian official, but he was actually an undercover FBI agent, the suit said.

In the year At a Baltimore hotel on Aug. 17, Gabriel told an undercover agent he was “patriotically motivated to give Russia any help he could, even if it meant getting fired or going to jail,” the indictment says.

At the meeting, she agreed to bring her husband into the plan, saying that Henry had information about US military training for Ukraine and other things.

In another meeting that day, Henry tells an undercover agent that he, too, is committed to Russia and is considering volunteering to join the Russian army.

“What I’m seeing now in Ukraine is that the United States is using the Ukrainians’ hatred of Russia as a proxy,” Henry told the agent.

The agent in turn urged them to read a book called “Inside the Aquarium: The Making of a Top Soviet Spy,” which would help the pair understand what they were about to do.

“It’s the mentality of sacrificing everything … and loyalty in you from the first day,” said the agent. “That’s not where you’re going.”

Henry had some reservations about providing health care information, claiming it would violate the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), according to the lawsuit, but Gabriela didn’t hesitate.

In the year At a subsequent meeting on August 24, she told the agent that her husband was a “coward” for worrying about violating HIPAA, but that she had “always” violated the law and would confirm that Russia had access to Fort’s medical records. Bragg patients.

By the end of the month, she had turned over information on current and former military officials and their spouses, the indictment says.

Reporting by Sarah N. Lynch; Editing by Jonathan Otis and Daniel Wallis

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