DOJ charges prosecutor with stealing Trump documents case report
This image, included in a court filing filed by the Justice Department on Aug. 30, 2022 and partially redacted by the source, shows a photo of documents seized during the FBI’s search of former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago mansion on Aug. 8, 2022.
Ministry of Justice | access point
A former federal prosecutor has been accused of stealing a sealed volume of a report prepared by then-special counsel Jack Smith on the defunct criminal case against President Donald Trump over his withholding of classified government documents after he left office in January 2021.
Carmen Mercedes Lineberger indicted on quadruple charges indictment Smith was unsealed Wednesday because he saved the sealed portion of his report on his government-issued computer under the file name “Bundt_Cake_Recipe.pdf” and then emailed the report from his DOJ email account to his personal Gmail account on Dec. 1, 2025.
At the time of the alleged conduct, Lineberger, 62, was managing an Assistant U.S. Attorney in Fort Pierce, Fla., according to the indictment in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida.
The indictment charges Lineberger with theft of government property and removal and alteration of public records.
On January 21, 2025, Judge Aileen Cannon ruled that the Department of Justice, as well as its officers and staff, had filed a lawsuit against Smith in Part II of Smith’s report to the court. He issued an order banning her from “publishing, sharing or transmitting” his volume.
Lineberger appeared in court in Fort Pierce on Wednesday and was released without having to post bail.
CNBC requested comment from Lineberger’s criminal defense attorney and the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
In July 2024, Cannon dismissed the Justice Department’s criminal case against Trump, alleging that Trump hid hundreds of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago clubhouse in Palm Beach, Fla., after the end of his first term and obstructed government efforts to recover the documents.
Cannon ruled that Smith’s appointment to prosecute Trump-related cases violated the Appointments Clause of the U.S. Constitution.
Smith later appealed this dismissal. But the Justice Department abandoned that effort after Trump was elected to a second nonconsecutive term in the White House in November 2024, due to department policy banning federal investigations of sitting presidents.
