Bradley Manning might take responsibility for WikiLeaks role through plea deal

Just shy of day 900 behind bars, accused whistleblower Pfc. Bradley Manning says he may accept responsibility for giving sensitive items to Wikileaks should the government decide to charge him with lesser offenses during his upcoming court-martial.

Manning, a 24-year-old Army private first class, has been detained under military custody since May 26, 2010 but has yet to be tried. The US government says the soldier supplied Julian Assange’s Wikileaks site with hundreds of thousands of diplomatic cables and other materials he is alleged to have had access to while deployed, and if convicted for as much he could be sentenced to life in prison. During pretrial motion hearings in Ft. Meade, Maryland early Wednesday, Manning’s legal counsel told the judge that their client has submitted a plea notice in the case that could greatly influence how next year’s scheduled court-martial plays out.

Firedoglake reports from Ft. Meade that civilian defense attorney David Coombs told the court Manning “would accept general responsibility for providing all charged information to WikiLeaks,” but that the soldier was not at this time pleading guilty to any charges. With the filing of the plea notice, however, Manning is now likely to admit to either having a role in relaying those materials to Wikileaks or else otherwise agree that the US government has sufficient enough evidence to prove his alleged guilt.