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Official clemency application from Chelsea Manning.
November 10, 2016
Also coverage by the Guardian and the New York Times. November 14, 2016
Chelsea has been informed that the Army will hold another disciplinary hearing on the second attempted suicide, which was prompted by the punishment given by the first disciplinary hearing following her initial suicide attempt.
New York Times
November 4, 2016
Chelsea Manning tried to commit suicide last month as she was starting a week of solitary confinement at the prison barracks at Fort Leavenworth, Kan., her punishment for a previous attempt to end her life in July.
Ms. Manning, the former Army intelligence analyst who is serving a 35-year sentence for leaking archives of secret documents to WikiLeaks, disclosed the attempted suicide, which took place Oct. 4, in a statement she dictated over the phone to a member of her volunteer support network. She asked that it be sent this week to The New York Times, according to members of the network who want to keep their identities private.
Chase Strangio, an American Civil Liberties Union lawyer representing Ms. Manning, formerly known as Bradley Manning, confirmed the attempt, which raised new questions about the military’s handling of the troubled soldier, dating to when she was permitted to deploy to Iraq and kept at her post in a secure facility despite signs of erratic behavior.
Read the full NYT article here
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Chelsea Manning Supporters Launch Last-Ditch Call for Clemency
With a protest outside the White House on Saturday and a vigil outside Fort Leavenworth prison, where Manning is being held, on Sunday, advocates are amplifying their call for a presidential pardon for Manning.
Specifically, supporters are asking President Barack Obama to commute Manning's sentence to time served, pointing to the fact that Manning "has already served more time in prison than any individual in United States history who disclosed information in the public interest," though "[h]er disclosures harmed no one."
Manning, who is serving a 35-year sentence, formally submitted a petition earlier this week asking for a reduced sentence.
"Chelsea Manning has been incarcerated since May 2010, including in unlawful, unusually harsh solitary confinement for 11 months before her trial," reads a new White House petition.
The petition draws attention to the fact that, as Obama himself has recognized, that "prisoners who face solitary confinement are more likely to commit suicide." And as a transgender woman in a men's facility "facing ongoing mistreatment," Manning is highly at risk.
In an appeal for clemency, American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) staff attorney Chase Strangio, a friend of Manning, published an open letter to Obama.
Noting Manning's repeated suicide attempts and ongoing mistreatment, on top of the "pain of serving in the Army for years under both Don't Ask, Don't Tell and the ban on open transgender service, Strangio writes: "If you do not act to free her now, she may never be free to live the truth that she for so long was forced to repress."
"This request comes at the peak of Chelsea's escalating trauma and despair and on the eve of a new Administration's rise to power," the letter continues. "Her life is in your hands."