Alaska soldier caught before causing damage, army says (Reuters)

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (Reuters) ? A U.S. soldier at an Alaska military base arrested on suspicion of espionage was caught before he could spread information that would damage national interests, an Army spokesman said on Wednesday.

Specialist William Colton Millay, a 22-year-old military policeman from Owensboro, Kentucky, was being watched closely prior to his arrest last Friday, Army spokesman Lt. Col. Bill Coppernoll said.

"Any information that might have been transferred was stopped," thanks to coordination between Army and civilian law enforcement agencies, Coppernoll said. "Millay was being observed well before any damage could have occurred."

Coppernoll did not say who Millay was suspected of spying for or what sensitive information he may have had access to, but said the arrest was unrelated to the WikiLeaks case, in which Army Private Bradley Manning is charged with downloading classified information and passing some of it to WikiLeaks.

"While we can't go into any specifics, this is completely different than the Bradley Manning case in that it does not involve the transfer of data on computer networks," he said.

Military charges against Millay were expected to be brought this week under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, Coppernoll said. The case was expected to be prosecuted in Alaska, he said.

Millay was arrested following a joint espionage investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Army Counterintelligence special agents. He was being held without bail at the Anchorage Correctional Complex, a state-operated jail where he has been since Friday, a jail spokesman said.

Millay is part of the 164th Military Police Company at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, a combined Air Force and Army base in Anchorage. The group is known by its motto: the "Arctic Enforcers."

The company deployed earlier this year to Afghanistan, but Millay was among a group of soldiers left behind in a "rear detachment," Coppernoll said. Typically, some soldiers are left behind when a unit is deployed, he said.

(Editing by Mary Slosson and Cynthia Johnston)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/usmilitary/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111102/us_nm/us_usa_army_espionage

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