Chelsea Manning Has Been Released From Jail After Refusing To Testify To A Grand Jury

But Manning could soon be jailed again over her refusal to testify about WikiLeaks or Julian Assange.

Chelsea Manning, who was jailed for two months after refusing to testify to a grand jury about WikiLeaks was released Thursday, her attorneys confirmed.

Manning, a former Army intelligence analyst, was arrested in 2010 after leaking hundreds of thousands of documents to WikiLeaks. She was sentenced to 35 years in prison but her sentence was commuted in 2017 by then-president Obama.

She was jailed again in March after she refused to testify to a grand jury in the US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia.

On Thursday, Manning was released from a detention center in Alexandria, Virginia, after the grand jury's term expired. But before Manning was released, she was served with another subpoena, her attorneys said. She is expected to appear before a different grand jury May 16.

It's not clear exactly what prosecutors want to ask Manning, but she and her attorneys have said that she will continue to refuse to testify about WikiLeaks or its founder, Julian Assange.

Assange was arrested in London April 11 and is facing a charge of conspiracy to commit computer intrusion for agreeing to break a password to a classified government computer.

Manning was already being held for refusing to testify. She appealed her detention and argued that the government was abusing the grand jury process, but the 4th Circuit rejected the appeal.

In court, her attorneys have also reasserted that Manning "will never be convinced to cooperate with the grand jury."

"It is therefore conceivable that she will once again be held in contempt of court, and be returned to the custody of the Alexandria Detention Center," her attorneys said. "Chelsea will continue to refuse to answer questions, and will use every available legal defense to prove to District Judge [Anthony] Trenga that she has just cause for her refusal to give testimony."


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