David McBride Sentenced to Five Years and Eight Months in Prison
Former Army Lawyer Pleads Guilty to Stealing and Sharing Secret Commonwealth Information
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David McBride, a former Army lawyer, was sentenced to five years and eight months in prison on Tuesday. McBride pleaded guilty to three charges of stealing and unlawfully sharing secret Commonwealth information. The charges stem from McBride's leaking of classified documents to the ABC in 2013. The documents revealed that Australian troops had allegedly committed war crimes in Afghanistan.
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McBride's sentencing ends a long legal battle between the former soldier and the Commonwealth. McBride was initially arrested in 2014 and charged with five offences under the Crimes Act. However, the charges were later dropped after a magistrate ruled that the evidence against McBride was inadmissible. The Commonwealth appealed the decision and the charges were reinstated in 2018.
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McBride pleaded guilty to the charges on the eve of his trial last year. In a statement to the court, McBride said that he felt a moral duty to speak up about the alleged war crimes he had witnessed in Afghanistan. He said that he had tried to raise his concerns internally but had been ignored. McBride's lawyer, Greg Barns, said that his client was a whistleblower who had acted in the public interest.
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The Commonwealth prosecutor, Mark Dreyfus, said that McBride's actions had put the lives of Australian soldiers at risk. He said that McBride had breached the trust that had been placed in him as a member of the ADF. Dreyfus said that the sentence handed down by the court should send a message that those who breach the secrecy laws will be punished.