WASHINGTON — Federal prosecutors said on Friday they had reached a tentative plea agreement with a former CIA officer found with more than $40 million in gold bars in the basement of his Virginia home.

In a court filing nominally seeking an extension of time to file an indictment, government lawyers and a lawyer for the former officer told a federal district court in Virginia that a “preindictment resolution promotes the public interest,” citing in part the extensive hurdles that dealing with classified material might create to a trial.

“The parties have made significant progress and have a plea agreement in principle that would resolve the matter prior to an indictment,” the government and defense lawyers wrote in a joint filing to the court.

U.S. officials have said the former officer, David J. Rush, created a fake classified program — one that only a few people were permitted to know about — that allowed him to accumulate the gold bars. The filing did not indicate what charges Rush might plead to or what punishment he might face.

The CIA declined to comment and referred questions to the Justice Department, which did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Rush’s lawyer also did not immediately respond.

Rush, who was an officer in the CIA’s science and technology division, was arrested on May 19 when FBI agents found 303 gold bars and nearly three dozen luxury watches in his home.

He was charged in May only with stealing public money by filling out fraudulent time sheets. But court documents also outlined the discovery of the gold bars.

Officials say they learned about the full details of the fake program only after Rush was arrested.

A public trial for Rush was always unlikely.

At the time of his arrest, Rush was at work on highly classified programs for both the CIA and the Pentagon, secret and covert work that government officials wanted to keep under wraps.

Rush had worked closely with Stephen A. Feinberg, deputy secretary of defense, for years. Before the CIA fired Rush, the two had collaborated on a highly classified program focused on spying on China.

When the CIA began investigating Rush, Feinberg reached out to the agency to vouch for Rush’s work for the Pentagon.

In their filing, the lawyers for the government and for Rush asked the court to give them until Oct. 8 to reach an agreement.

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This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

By Julian E. Barnes, Devlin Barrett and Seamus Hughes/Tom Brenner
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