Veteran federal prosecutor Carmen Mercedes Lineberger has been charged with stealing a sealed special counsel report about Donald Trump's classified documents case by emailing it to herself under fake "recipe" file names, according to a newly unsealed federal indictment.
Lineberger, 62, a former managing assistant U.S. attorney in the Southern District of Florida's Fort Pierce office, is accused of secretly transmitting a sealed Justice Department report prepared by then–special counsel Jack Smith on Trump's handling of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago.
Prosecutors say the report, identified as "Volume II Report," was subject to strict court-ordered secrecy when she sent it. A federal judge had barred DOJ employees from sharing or distributing copies of the report outside authorized channels, according to People.
According to the indictment, Lineberger received the sealed Smith report on her official Justice Department email account in January 2025.
In December 2025, she allegedly forwarded it to her personal Gmail account, renaming the attachment "Bundt_Cake_Recipe.pdf" and using a subject line referencing a bundt cake recipe in an apparent effort to conceal its contents. Prosecutors say she also saved a version on her government computer under a similar "Bt_C_Recipe" label.
The case also centers on separate messages months earlier in which Lineberger allegedly copied portions of internal Justice Department communications and an internal memo marked "for official use only" into a new document.
She is accused of emailing that material from her work account to a personal Hotmail address with an attachment titled "chocolate_cake_recipe.pdf" and a subject line referring to a chocolate cake recipe. Prosecutors say those records were also covered by confidentiality protections tied to the Trump investigation, the Washington Examiner reported.
Lineberger is charged with multiple felonies, including two counts of theft of government property, one count of destruction or falsification of records in a federal investigation, and one count of concealment or removal of public records.
The charges stem from alleged violations of federal record-keeping laws and court orders governing the handling of sealed investigative materials. If convicted on all counts, she faces a potential sentence of up to 20 years in prison, according to prosecutors.
In court on Wednesday in West Palm Beach, Lineberger pleaded not guilty to all charges. She was released pending trial under conditions that were not fully detailed in public filings.
Officials have not publicly described a motive, and prosecutors say there is no evidence so far that the report or internal memo was further distributed beyond her personal accounts, as per PBS.
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