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View Full Version : 560 days later...Manning still awaiting trial



SouthCarolinaSooner
11/14/2011, 05:45 PM
Where are you hardline letter of the law Constitutionalists on this one?

"In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence."


Five months ago, on April 22, 2011, over 400 citizens converged on Quantico Marine Base to protest the pre-trial conditions of alleged Wikileaks whistleblower US Army Private First Class Bradley Manning. Manning was arrested on May 26, 2010, on a U.S. military base in Iraq on suspicion of giving classified material to the website WikiLeaks.

No Speedy Trial-Manning still in pre-trial confinement after 560 days

Manning still is in pre-trial confinement, 560 days after he was arrested.

Manning was charged on July 5, 2010, with transferring classified materials on his personal computer, and communicating national defense information to an unauthorized source. An additional 22 charges were added on March 1, 2011, including wrongfully obtaining classified material for the purpose of posting it on the Internet knowing that the information would be accessed by the enemy; the illegal transmission of defense information; fraud; and aiding the enemy. In April, 2011, he was found fit to face a court martial and currently awaits the first hearing.

Conditions during pre-trial confinement at Quantico Marine Base

As soon as he was transferred from Kuwait to the Marine Corps Brig at Quantico, Virginia in July 29, 2010, Manning was held in solitary confinement and forced nudity. He was classified as a “maximum custody detainee” and held under a “Prevention of Injury” designation for nine months until he was transferred in April 2011. A Prevention of Injury order is just short of suicide watch and means that guards check the cell every five minutes with the prisoner not allowed to sleep during the day. Manning was not allowed to sleep between 5 am (7 am at weekends) and 8 pm, and if he tried to, was made to stand or sit up. At Quantico he was detained in a 6 x 12 foot cell, with no window, and only a bed, toilet and sink. He ate his meals in his cell. Manning could walk outside his cell only while shackled and for only one hour. He was allowed to keep only one book and one magazine in his cell.

He was required to remain visible to the guards at all times, including at night, which meant that he had no sheets and no pillow except one built into his mattress. Until March, 2011 he was required to sleep in boxer shorts, and had experienced chafing of the skin from the heavy blanket which was designed so it could not be shredded. On March 2, 2011, Manning was informed that an Article 138 complaint filed in January by his lawyer, that requested that he be removed from maximum custody and prevention-of-injury watch, had been denied. This resulted in him being required to sleep without clothing and present himself naked outside his cell for morning inspection, which his lawyer described as ritual humiliation. From March 10 onwards he was given a wrap-around smock with Velcro fasteners to sleep in. In response to the incident, the brig psychiatrist classified him as at “low risk of suicide.”

Public outcry against conditions of Manning’s confinement

Amnesty International called the conditions “harsh and punitive.” In April, 2011, 295 scholars, including legal scholars and philosophers signed a letter saying the conditions the Marines kept Manning in amounted to a violation of the U.S. Constitution.

In March, 2011, State Department spokesperson and retired US Air Force Colonel P.J. Crowley resigned from his government position after he stated, “What is being done to Bradley Manning is ridiculous and counterproductive and stupid on the part of the department of defense.” Crowley’s statement forced President Obama to address for the first time the issue of Manning’s handling at Quantico marine base in Virginia. Obama defended the way Manning is being treated, saying he had been reassured by the Pentagon that his confinement was appropriate.

President Obama has prejudiced the case against Manning by his statement that Manning “broke the law.” At a fundraiser in San Francisco, California in April, 2011, in a video recording, Obama responded to a questioner, “I can’t conduct diplomacy on an open source,” “That’s not how … the world works. If I was to release stuff, information that I’m not authorized to release, I’m breaking the law … We’re a nation of laws. We don’t individually make our own decisions about how the laws operate … He broke the law.”

Manning transferred to an appropriate pre-trial confinement facility one month after Quantico arrests

After the publicity concerning Manning’s treatment, the rally and the arrests, one month later on April 20, 2011, the Pentagon transferred him to a pre-trial confinement portion of a medium-security facility at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. At Fort Leavenworth, the prevention-of-injury order was lifted, Manning’s clothes were not removed at night, and he has a cell with a large window with natural light and a normal mattress. He now can have contact with other pre-trial detainees, write whenever he wants, and keep personal objects, such as books and letters, in his cell.

Manning will turn 24 on December 17, 2011.

http://www.indypendent.org/2011/11/14/no-speedy-trial-for-bradley-manning/

NormanPride
11/14/2011, 05:58 PM
I imagine they want him shot.

Breadburner
11/14/2011, 06:07 PM
Who cares....

Tulsa_Fireman
11/14/2011, 06:15 PM
Check Article 32 subheading A of the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

Is the investigation complete?