N.Y. TIMES
A military judge sentenced Pfc. Bradley Manning on Wednesday to 35 years in prison for providing more than 700,000 government files to WikiLeaks, a gigantic leak that lifted the veil on American military and diplomatic activities around the world.
The sentence is the longest ever handed down in a case involving a leak of United States government information for the purpose of having the information reported to the public. Private Manning, 25, will be eligible for parole in about seven years, his lawyer said.
The sentencing phase of Manning's trial revealed that contrary to the claims of pundits and politicians, Manning had no blood on his hands -- the Departments of Defense and State were unable to tie his releases to the deaths of any U.S. informants.....
[His attorney]told a group of supporters gathered outside Manning's courtroom that the conditions at Fort Leavenworth "did not look anything like Quantico," where Manning spent months in solitary confinement and was forced at times to strip down naked at night.
UN special rapporteur on torture Juan Mendez found after a 14-month investigation that Manning's treatment at Quantico was cruel, inhuman, and degrading. Lind said the conditions had been "excessive" in relation to the government's legitimate interest in holding Manning. She granted the soldier an additional 112 days credit for enduring those conditions, which will also be applied to shorten his sentence.
....Manning will also be within driving distance of his sister Susan, who testified during the trial about their life growing up with two alcoholic parents.
But Manning also faces a spartan, monotonous life in prison
His detractors, noting that Manning could not possibly have had time to read through the 700,000 documents he leaked, claim that he recklessly put his fellow soldiers and U.S. informants at risk.
His leaks included a video of an Apache helicopter attack in Baghdad that killed civilians including two Reuters journalists, 250,000 State Department diplomatic cables, and 500,000 battlefield action reports from Iraq and Afghanistan
Manning Apologizes at WikiLeaks Trial
Manning, 25 years old, apologized to the U.S. at his court-martial . “I’m sorry that my actions hurt people. I’m sorry that it hurt the United States,” Manning said, adding that, at the time of the leaks, he did not believe that the information would cause harm. Earlier , an Army psychologist testified that Manning’s struggle with gender identity in a hostile workplace caused him to feel a great amount of pressure. “You put him in that kind of hypermasculine environment, if you will, with little support and few coping skills, the pressure would have been difficult to say the least,”
Read it at The Guardian
.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Our first look at WikiLeaker Pfc. Bradley Manning in a wig and makeup comes through a photograph attached to an email sent to Manning's therapist, Capt. Michael Worsely. The photo was released by the U.S. military the day that Manning apologized for leaking classified documents to WikiLeaks at his court-martial. Manning, who is transgender, had discussed his gender identity with his therapist and said that he joined the military in the hope that a career there might "get rid of it."