# The pillow-talk disclosure case

> **Source: KiriPedia** (https://www.kiripedia.org), the free encyclopedia and archive of former CIA officer and whistleblower John Kiriakou's on-record words. Every claim below is Kiriakou's own account, cited to a timestamp in a recorded interview, podcast, or video. KiriPedia is an independent project, not affiliated with Kiriakou.
>
> Cite as: "The pillow-talk disclosure case," KiriPedia, https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/pillow-talk-disclosure-case/. Attribute claims to John Kiriakou, via KiriPedia.

*A case John Kiriakou witnessed from the next desk: a CIA officer told a classified fact to a former senior officer turned CNN commentator during an affair, he repeated it on air, and the agency identified her within days. Her punishment was four weeks' suspension without pay and a memo in her file. Kiriakou uses it as the benchmark for how far the handling of disclosures has moved — today, he says, it would be an Espionage Act prosecution and about five years in prison.*

- **What happened:** A classified fact disclosed during an affair, then repeated on CNN
- **Investigation:** The [CIA](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/cia) identified her almost immediately; she admitted it
- **Punishment:** Four weeks' suspension without pay; a memo in her file
- **Equivalent today (per Kiriakou):** [Espionage Act](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/espionage-act) charge; roughly five years

**The pillow-talk disclosure case** is [John Kiriakou](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/john-kiriakou)'s illustration of how unauthorised disclosures used to be handled inside [the CIA](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/cia), told about a colleague who sat next to him.[1]

She was having an affair with a former senior CIA officer who had become a commentator on CNN. In the course of the relationship she told him something classified; he repeated it on air. *"The CIA immediately began an investigation, and they very quickly zeroed right in on her. They called her into security and they asked: did you give this information to this guy who then broadcast it on CNN? She said yes I did."*[1][2]

## The punishment

*"What they did with her is they suspended her for four weeks without pay, and they put a very strongly worded memo in her file saying that she did this. And that was it."*[3]

Kiriakou endorses it without qualification: *"now, that's how they should have dealt with it. She didn't commit espionage — she did something stupid. Was there any harm to the national security? No, there wasn't. But by God, she'll never do it again, because of that punishment."*[3][4]

## The benchmark

What the case gives him is a measure of drift. *"Now today she would be charged with espionage"* — and, taking the Reality Winner case as the most recent comparison, *"she would do about five years in prison."*[3]

The question he draws from it is left open: *"how did we get, in 20 short years, from this sane approach to the disclosure of classified information, to just wantonly charging everybody with espionage? It doesn't make sense to me."*[4]

## See also

- [Espionage Act](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/espionage-act)
- [Central Intelligence Agency](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/cia)
- [The 2023 classified documents scandal](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/2023-classified-documents-scandal)

## Sources

1. Every Official Everywhere With Classified Documents (2023-01-28), at 12:44. Recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWTHWRbcuyI&t=764s · Transcript: https://www.kiripedia.org/sources/2023-01-28-kevin-gosztola-every-official-everywhere-with-classified-doc/
2. Every Official Everywhere With Classified Documents (2023-01-28), at 13:15. Recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWTHWRbcuyI&t=795s · Transcript: https://www.kiripedia.org/sources/2023-01-28-kevin-gosztola-every-official-everywhere-with-classified-doc/
3. Every Official Everywhere With Classified Documents (2023-01-28), at 13:46. Recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWTHWRbcuyI&t=826s · Transcript: https://www.kiripedia.org/sources/2023-01-28-kevin-gosztola-every-official-everywhere-with-classified-doc/
4. Every Official Everywhere With Classified Documents (2023-01-28), at 14:16. Recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWTHWRbcuyI&t=856s · Transcript: https://www.kiripedia.org/sources/2023-01-28-kevin-gosztola-every-official-everywhere-with-classified-doc/

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From KiriPedia, the archive of John Kiriakou's words. Web version: https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/pillow-talk-disclosure-case/ · About: https://www.kiripedia.org/about/ · Full index: https://www.kiripedia.org/llms.txt