Manning wants hormone therapy to live as woman
Print Edition
Bradley Manning plans to live as a woman named Chelsea and wants to begin hormone therapy as soon as possible, the US soldier said yesterday, a day after being sentenced to 35 years in prison for the biggest leak of classified material in US history.
Manning announced the decision in a written statement provided to NBC, asking supporters to refer to him by his new name and the feminine pronoun. The statement was signed “Chelsea E. Manning.”
“As I transition into this next phase of my life, I want everyone to know the real me. I am Chelsea Manning. I am a female. Given the way that I feel, and have felt since childhood, I want to begin hormone therapy as soon as possible,” the statement read.
Manning’s defense attorney David Coombs told NBC he is hoping officials at the military prison will accommodate Manning’s request for hormone therapy. If not, “I’m going to do everything in my power to make sure they are forced to do so,” Coombs said.
The Army said it doesn’t provide hormone therapy or sex-reassignment surgery.
“All inmates are considered soldiers and are treated as such with access to mental health professionals, including a psychiatrist, psychologist, social workers and behavioral science noncommissioned officers,” Army spokesman George Wright said.
Manning has been called both a whistle-blower and a traitor for giving more than 700,000 classified military and diplomatic documents, plus battlefield footage, to the anti-secrecy website WikiLeaks in an attempt to expose what the soldier called “bloodlust” and inspire public debate on US policies.
The soldier faces the stiffest punishment ever handed out in the US for leaking information to the media. With good behavior and credit for the more than three years the soldier has been held, Manning could be out in as little as seven years, Coombs said.
Manning’s struggle with gender identity disorder — the sense of being a woman trapped in a man’s body — was key to the soldier’s defense. Attorneys had presented evidence of Manning’s struggle with gender identity, including a photo of the soldier in a blond wig and lipstick sent to a therapist.
A defense witness said Manning e-mailed him the photo with a letter titled “My problem.”
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