Mar 03 2011

Death Penalty Charges Against Bradley Manning (Nauseating Update!)

(9 am. – promoted by ek hornbeck)

Bradley-Manning2

From CBS News…

The Army said Wednesday it has filed 22 additional charges against Pfc. Bradley E. Manning, the soldier suspected of providing classified government documents published by the WikiLeaks anti-secrecy group.

CBS News national security correspondent David Martin reports that the new charges for the first time formally accuse Manning of aiding the enemy.

And from the Guardian…

Manning’s lawyer, David Coombs, said that the most serious of the new charges was the Article 104 offence of “aiding the enemy”. The charge carries a potential death sentence.

And of course the bankers who destroyed the American economy are still raking in record profits and salaries with no fear of prosecution, including the weasels at Wachovia Bank who laundered $378 billion for drug cartels, and the war-criminals Dick Cheney and George W. Bush are still at large.

And would somebody please tell the ignorant sons-of-bitches who wrote the charge about “aiding the enemy” that…

WE HAVE NO “ENEMY” because…

WE ARE NOT AT WAR!

Or did I miss a Congressional Declaration of War in the last few minutes?

Update: From New York Magazine…

This is one for your Wikileaks fan fic: A lawyer for Private Bradley Manning says his client was stripped naked and left in his prison cell in the the Marine brig in Quantico, Virginia, without clothes for seven hours on Wednesday. And if that wasn’t bad enough, before Manning allowed to get dressed, he was forced to stand naked outside his cell while guards inspected the space. “This type of degrading treatment is inexcusable and without justification,” said Manning’s lawyer David E. Coombs. “It is an embarrassment to our military justice system and should not be tolerated. Pfc. Manning has been told that the same thing will happen to him again tonight. No other detainee at the brig is forced to endure this type of isolation and humiliation.” First Lt. Brian Villiard, a Marine spokesman, said that the action wasn’t punitive but declined to comment on what motivated the naked episode.

God damn those lying perverts!

23 comments

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  1. Bradley Manning has been held for over six months with no charges having been placed or had against him at all.  So, first of all, what does this mean?

    The Army said Wednesday it has filed 22 additional charges against Pfc. Bradley E. Manning, the soldier suspected of providing classified government documents published by the WikiLeaks anti-secrecy group.

    What do they mean by “additional?”  

    “Aiding the enemy?”  In what way?  He was/is a young man, as I see it, who was so sickened morally, mentally and emotionally, he could not help but to seek a source to release his information to — that is how I see it!  What he released “was after the fact!”  (And, I guess, we have to assume he was everywhere simultaneously to have been able to release so many facts from so many places . . . . . !)  But, you can see how they (the military and the government) could twist this all around to lay all onus on this young man, rather than looking at the heinous acts committed by US!  

    And no, there has never been a war declared by Congress, in Iraq or Afghanistan, or elsewhere, where we have aggressed and invaded nations that did not provocate us!

    Makes me sick!  This young man is being worn down by his conditions and that is the intent, such that he will have little fight within him.

    . . . .

    At the request of Manning’s defense attorneys, the trial proceedings have been delayed since July 12, 2010, pending the results of a defense requested inquiry into Manning’s mental capacity and responsibility pursuant to Rule for Courts-Martial (R.C.M.) 706. Depending on the results of the R.C.M. 706 board, an Article 32 hearing may follow. An Article 32 hearing is the civilian equivalent of a grand jury, with additional rights afforded to the accused. . . .

  2. I’ve been reading speculation that this is revenge for his not naming Assange as a co-conspirator.  

    Like jailing Leonard Peltier: All got it that someone had to go to prison for murdering an FBI agent; might as well be the wrong guy if the alternative was No Guy.

  3. Defense, Robert Gates, to drop the charges of “aiding the enemy!”

                                       

    The US has essentially declared pro-democracy protesters in the Middle East and North Africa “enemies” of the State!

    Today, the US Army announced new, more serious charges against accused WikiLeaker Pfc. Bradley Manning, The government is now charging Manning with aiding the enemy – a crime that carries a maximum penalty of life in prison without parole.

    If the government claims that Manning leaked documents which aided and abetted the enemy, who exactly are they labeling as ‘the enemy?’ The millions of non-violent, pro-democracy demonstrators in Tunisia and Egypt who overthrew despots, in part sparked by the release of the Wikileaks cables that exposed corruption in their countries?

    Manning is being charged under military law, which is administered by Secretary of Defense Robert Gates.

    We’re calling on Secretary Gates to drop the charges of ‘aiding the enemy’ so wrongfully leveled against Manning – can you join us?

    Sign our petition to Secretary of Defense Robert Gates to drop the charges of ‘aiding the enemy’ against Bradley Manning and not make enemies of pro-democracy movements abroad.

    The government’s new accusations against Bradley Manning are far beyond what those with which he has already been charged. It’s one thing to accuse Manning of leaking information; it’s quite another to charge him with helping our enemies.

    Manning sits alone in his cell for 23 hours a day as a prisoner abused by his own government. Meanwhile, revelations of official corruption and abuse from the cables he allegedly leaked have helped spark a firestorm in the Middle East and North Africa, inspiring popular uprisings to overthrow brutal dictatorships from Tunisia to Libya.

    To put it in perspective, the government wants to imprison Manning for life as someone who “aided the enemy,” when the documents in question helped bring about democratic change in some of the most authoritarian and oppressive countries in the world.

    Tell Defense Secretary Gates: drop the ridiculous charges of aiding and abetting the enemy against Bradley Manning.

    The US government has held Manning under restrictions that have kept him in severe isolation for 10 months and counting, as they struggle to bring charges against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. Since they can’t make a case against Assange, they are upping the pressure on Manning.

    All of this takes place as the US struggles to bring charges against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange for merely unearthing embarrassing state cables. Since they can’t make a case against Assange, they are upping the pressure on Manning in hopes that prosecuting one will lead to the arrest of the other.

    Manning’s treatment by the US government has been appalling so far, and their latest tact as enemies of pro-democratic movements abroad has taken this saga in a disturbing direction. We must stand up for Manning and the protestors he allegedly inspired abroad.

    Click here to sign our petition to Defense Secretary Gates to drop Bradley Manning’s “aiding the enemy” charges.”

    Thanks for all you do.

    Michael Whitney

    Firedoglake.com

    • TMC on March 4, 2011 at 00:16
    • #

    had a link to Kevin Jon Heller entry at his blog that discusses these charge of aiding the enemy and the stretch of using it to charge Manning. Marcy, Heller and Greenwald have some good analysis of the difficulty of proving this but the ramifications if they succeed:

       [1] Manning is guilty of “giving intelligence to the enemy,” because he gave intelligence to WikiLeaks that he knew would be made available on the internet, and an enemy of the United States did, in fact, access that information.

       [2] Manning is guilty of “commun[i]cating with the enemy” because he gave information to WikiLeaks intending that an enemy of the United States would receive it.  (The “intent required” view.)

       [3] Manning is guilty of “communicating with the enemy” because he gave information to WikiLeaks knowing that it would be published on the internet, where any enemy could access it. (The intent not required view.)

    As Marcy points out from Keller’s argument, #1 and #3 are what newspapers do. Are they also going to charge the NYT and WaPo?

    The first and third arguments are thus the most plausible.  Both, however, suffer from a very significant problem: if Manning has aided the enemy, so has any media organization that published the information he allegedly stole.  

    Nothing in Article 104 requires proof that the defendant illegally acquired the information that aided the enemy.  As a result, if the mere act of ensuring that harmful information is published on the internet qualifies either as indirectly “giving intelligence to the enemy” (if the military can prove an enemy actually accessed the information) or as indirectly “communicating with the enemy” (because any reasonable person knows that enemies can access information on the internet), there is no relevant factual difference between Manning and a media organization that published the relevant information.

    The big problem with #2 is that in order to prove that the government would have to produce evidence that Manning gave the information to Wikileaks with the intent that it be given to Al Qaeda or some other terrorist organization.

    BTW, the military has said that they won’t seek the death penalty. That does not, however, preclude the judge from imposing it.

    Since the government case against Assange has fallen apart because they can’t find a link between him and Manning, I see this as clearly another means to get Manning to lie and testify against Assange. More psychological torture

  5. A slimier weasel as president would be hard to invent.

    Annihilating two countries that had no citizens on any 9/11 plane is insanely immoral, and playing kill games with drones in another is nothing but surreal murder.

    Everyday now the shit is so thick that the toilet can’t even handle it: Destroying unions and collective bargaining and now threatening Manning with the possible death penalty or life in prison are nothing but symptoms of total moral disintegration of government and turning back the clock——-way back! And the vast majority of Americans sleep in a deep coma.  

  6. there goes the rest of us.

    Not probably literally.

    But if we don’t stand up, as we haven’t stood up for the war deserters , then it’s our access to information about what “our” government is doing with “our” money that will suffer, and our voices will become as silent as his now is.  

  7. It gets more about revenge now according to David Coombs’ new report:

    http://www.armycourtmartialdef…

  8. You know, the kind who file those freedom of information requests, who believe in government transparency etc. That’s what it all boils down to. This administration has determined that liberal principals (i.e. principals of freedom) must take a back seat to the “global war against terrorism”. The terrorists have officially won.

  9. So on to the CIA toppling governments of the middle east.

    http://www.globalresearch.ca/i…

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