Ex-NSA contractor to be sentenced in stolen documents case

BALTIMORE (AP) — A former National Security Agency contractor awaits sentencing in Baltimore’s federal court for storing two decades’ worth of classified documents at his Maryland home.

Harold Martin’s plea agreement calls for a nine-year prison sentence, but U.S. District Judge Richard Bennett isn’t bound by the deal’s terms when he sentences Martin on Friday.

Martin’s sentencing will resolve a mysterious case that broke into the open in 2016, when FBI agents conducting a raid found stolen government documents inside his home, car and storage shed.

The case has attracted attention since hacking tools stolen from the NSA were also published by a cryptic Internet group that called itself the Shadow Brokers. Prosecutors never linked Martin to the group.

Martin’s defense lawyers described him as a compulsive hoarder who never betrayed his country.