Following last week’s end of testimony, both sides Pfc. Bradley Manning court-martial were scheduled to deliver their closing arguments at Fort Meade, Md. today. Before the arguments can begin, the judge presiding over the case must rule on the defense’s motion to acquit Manning of five counts of theft on his list of nearly two dozen charges. His defense has request multiple times since his indictment to drop the charge of aiding the enemy, but so far Manning still faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted. The charges stem from a 2009 leak of hundreds of thousands of…
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Ten witnesses testified in defense of Pfc. Bradley Manning between July 8-11, as his defense attorneys argued that though he is guilty of releasing a mountain of sensitive documents, he did not risk American lives in the process. In week six of Manning’s court-martial on charges that the hundreds of thousands of documents he gave to WikiLeaks resulted in danger to troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, the defense opened and rested their case at the Fort Meade, Md. trial. The defense called law Harvard professor Yochai Benkler to dispel the most serious of Manning’s 21 charges, aiding the enemy. Benkler…
The government called its 28th and final live witness this week as the prosecution wrapped up its case in the Bradley Manning court martial. In addition to bringing in a Defense Intelligence Agency official for a closed-door testimony, the prosecution presented two key pieces of evidence that could prove Manning information leaks aided al-Qaida. They cited an al-Qaida propaganda video in which an American member of the group referred to information from the leak. Additionally, battlefield reports and other information Manning leaked were found on digital media seized during the 2011 raid on Osama bin Laden’s compound in Pakistan. The…
June 3 marked day one of Pfc. Bradley Manning’s long-awaited court martial for leaking hundreds of thousands of classified government documents to WikiLeaks. Manning has already agreed to plead guilty to several charges on his sheet — just not aiding the enemy. The others carry a maximum prison sentence of 20 years, while treason could land him in prison for life. In order for prosecutors to make a case that Manning aided the enemy, they have to prove that he knew the documents he leaked might end up in al-Qaida’s hands. In the first three days of testimony this week,…
It looks like Brig. Gen. Jeffrey Sinclair’s secret nickname has inspired a meme of its own. In our latest update to Sinclair’s sex scandal and subsequent court-martial, we ran a few lines from his text message exchanges with his mistress. Facebook feedback tells us that readers particularly enjoyed this tidbit.
Success of women in combat will hinge on fairness, fitness The historic decision to lift the ban on women in combat roles is not the end of their battle for opportunity — it is the beginning. Now the effort shifts from granting equality to maintaining fairness as the Army executes an aggressive plan to uphold — and perhaps raise — individual standards without excluding women by default. Women have fought with distinction in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the Pentagon has, for the past year, formulated its plan to break down the barriers to allow them in direct combat roles, a…
