LONDON, Oct 28: A senior civil servant pleaded guilty on Tuesday to breaching the Official Secrets Act by leaving a top-secret intelligence file on a commuter train.

Richard Jackson, 37, from Yateley, Hampshire, admitted negligence after he mislaid two documents when he inadvertently took them home on June 10. He was physically sick when he realised he had lost the files on a train from London Waterloo to Surrey, the Press Association said.

During the hearing, he spent much of the time with his head in his hands. He faces a maximum possible sentence of three months in prison.

Defence lawyer Neil Saunders told City of Westminster Magistrates Court in central London that Jackson had been under extreme pressure at the time of the loss. “It may well be partly because of his own role, the team he was leading and the work he was being asked to conduct that he has made this gross error of judgment,” he said.

Jackson did not report the loss of the files until the following day as his immediate bosses were abroad.Prosecutor Deborah Walsh said: “This delay in reporting delayed any action to recover the files.”

One of the documents was marked top secret and the other was mid-level security.

Jackson was on secondment from the Ministry of Defence to the Cabinet Office, the department that describes itself as the “head office” of government.—Reuters