Chelsea Manning may be transferred to civilian prison for gender treatment

Defence secretary has given approval for army to try to work out transfer plan with Federal Bureau of Prisons, officials say

theguardian.com, Associated Press in Washington, Wednesday 14 May 2014

Chelsea Manning, convicted last year of passing classified documents to
 WikiLeaks, has asked for hormone therapy and to be able to live as a
woman. Photograph: AP

The Pentagon is trying to transfer Chelsea Manning to a civilian prison so that she can get treatment for her gender disorder.

Manning, who was convicted last year of passing classified documents to WikiLeaks, has asked for hormone therapy and to be able to live as a woman.

It was the first such request by a transgender military inmate, and set up a dilemma for the US defence department: how to treat a soldier for a diagnosed disorder without violating longstanding military policy.

Transgender people are not allowed to serve in the US military, and the defence department does not provide such treatment, but Manning cannot be discharged from the service while serving her 35-year prison sentence.

Some officials have said privately that keeping the soldier in a military prison and unable to have treatment could amount to cruel and unusual punishment.

Last month, the defence secretary, Chuck Hagel, gave the army approval to try to work out a transfer plan with the Federal Bureau of Prisons, which does provide such treatment, two Pentagon officials said. The two agencies were just starting discussions about prospects for a transfer, the officials said.

The Pentagon press secretary, Rear Admiral John Kirby, said: "No decision to transfer Private Manning to a civilian detention facility has been made, and any such decision will, of course, properly balance the soldier's medical needs with our obligation to ensure she remains behind bars."

The army has a memorandum of agreement with the Bureau of Prisons for use of several hundred beds and has sent an average of 15 to 20 prisoners a year to civilian prisons. But the circumstances are different in Manning's case. The army normally transfers some prisoners to federal prisons after all military appeals have been exhausted and discharge from military service has been executed. Cases of national security interest are not normally approved for transfer from military custody to the federal prison system.

Manning, a former intelligence analyst, was sentenced in August for six Espionage Act violations and 14 other offences for giving WikiLeaks more than 700,000 secret military and US state department documents, along with battlefield video, while working in Iraq in 2009 and 2010.

After the conviction, Manning announced the desire to live as a woman and to change her name from Bradley, which the military did not oppose and which was approved last month by a Leavenworth county district judge.

The soldier has been diagnosed by military doctors multiple times with gender dysphoria. By November, a military doctor had approved a treatment plan including hormone therapy, but it was sent higher up the chain of command for consideration, according to a complaint filed by Manning in March over the delay in getting treatment.

The plan the military was considering has not been publicly released, but Manning said in the complaint that she had specifically asked that the treatment plan consider three types of treatment.

They were "real-life experience" – a regimen in which the person tries dressing and living as the gender they want to transition to (something not possible in the Leavenworth men's facility); hormone therapy, which changes some physical traits such as breast and hair growth; and gender reassignnment surgery. Manning has not been specific about possible surgery, but experts in transgender health say it can include any of a large number of procedures such as chest reconstruction, genital reconstruction and plastic surgery such as facial reconstruction.

Hagel said on Sunday that the prohibition on transgender individuals serving in the armed forces "continually should be reviewed". He did not indicate whether he believed the policy should be overturned, but said: "Every qualified American who wants to serve our country should have an opportunity if they fit the qualifications and can do it."

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