BREAKING: 63-year-old US Air Force employee arrested for giving classified intel on Ukraine to woman he met on dating site who dubbed him ‘Sweet Dave’

Retired Army Lieutenant Colonel David Franklin Slater, 63, was arrested on March 2 and charged with multiple counts of conspiracy to transmit and the transmission of national defense information.

According to the Department of Justice, Slater worked in a "classified space at USSTRATCOM and held a Top Secret security clearance" from August 2021 until April 2022, during which time he was privy to classified information regarding Russia and Ukraine.

Slater then allegedly "transmitted classified NDI that he learned from those briefings via the foreign online dating website's messaging platform to his co-conspirator, who claimed to be a female living in Ukraine on the foreign dating website."

The DOJ explaiend that the co-conspirator "regularly asked Slater to provide her with sensitive, non-public, closely held and classified NDI and called Slater in their messages her 'secret informant love' and her 'secret agent'," and that, "in response to these requests, Slater indeed provided classified NDI to her, including regarding military targets and Russian military capabilities relating to Russia's invasion of Ukraine."

The indictment revealed that messages received by Slater include "Beloved Dave, do NATO and Biden have a secret plan to help us," "Sweet Dave, the supply of weapons is completely classified, which is great," and "Dave, I hope tomorrow NATO will prepare a very unpleasant 'surprise' for Putin! Will you tell me?"

Slater is expected to make his first court appearance on March 5 in his home state of Nebraska. If convicted, he faces a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison, three years of supervised release, and a fine of up to $250,000 for each count.

This is a breaking story and will be updated.