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A outmoded Department of Justice prosecutor is facing legal payments after emailing herself a sealed Biden-generation investigative report regarding Donald Trump and making an strive to cover the paperwork as cake recipes, federal authorities said on Wednesday.

Carmen Mercedes Lineberger, who labored as a managing assistant US legal knowledgeable in Florida, is facing two counts of theft of authorities money or property besides to payments related to her alleged alteration of the paperwork, in response to the indictment.

In early 2025, Lineberger received a duplicate of an interior report “related to a pending federal criminal investigation”, which she would later send from her justice division inbox to her personal email in December 2025, in response to the indictment. The report became as soon as filed within the US district court docket for the southern district of Florida, the keep she became as soon as employed.

Lineberger allegedly sought to cover evidence of the document by altering its name to “Bundt_Cake_Recipe.pdf” sooner than saving it to her authorities-issued laptop, prosecutors said.

The indictment did not provide extra info in regards to the character of the report, but it absolutely did impart the document as being blocked from public free up, per an interpret from US district pick Aileen M Cannon.

Cannon, who Trump has previously lauded as a “mannequin of what a pick wants to be”, barred the outmoded justice division special counsel Jack Smith from discussing or sharing any findings from his investigation into Trump’s alleged mishandling of White Home paperwork at the stop of his first time duration.

Smith also led an investigation into Trump’s alleged subject to obstruct the 2020 election. Both circumstances had been dropped after Trump secured a second time duration. Justice division coverage protects sitting presidents from criminal prosecution.

In a January court docket submitting, federal prosecutors condemned Smith’s report. “The illicit made from an unlawful investigation and prosecution belongs within the dustbin of historical past,” they said.

Meanwhile, advocacy teams bear sought to u.s. the report via court docket appeals.

It is unclear why Lineberger may perhaps bear despatched the report to herself. She faces a most sentence of 25 years in jail if convicted of the payments.