Chelsea Manning Tried Committing Suicide a Second Time in …

Since her suicide attempt in October, Ms. Manning, 28, has been released from the special observation unit and returned to the general inmate population, and can again receive mail and make phone calls. Still, two members of the support network said Ms. Manning had told them that she continued to see the attackers who posed as guards around the prison until Oct. 27.

Dr. Stuart Grassian, a psychiatrist who is a specialist in the psychiatric effects of solitary confinement, said it was a mistake to subject people who have exhibited irrational behavior to the stresses of isolation the way the military does in punishing suicidal inmates by placing them in solitary confinement.

Dr. Grassian cautioned that he did not know Ms. Manning and had not examined her, but said that a classic symptom experienced by inmates held in solitary confinement, especially if they were fragile to begin with, is a form of delirium whose characteristics include hallucinations, paranoia, intense agitation and confusion.

While in Iraq, Ms. Manning was cited for responding with disproportionately angry outbursts when she was chastised over minor misconduct; went catatonic at times while talking; and was found in the fetal position with a knife, witnesses said. Yet her supervisor never pulled her from the secure facility where she had access to classified information or recommended filing a report that could have revoked her security clearance.

That supervisor, then a master sergeant, was demoted for failing to alert commanders of the warning signs. At Ms. Mannings trial, he testified that he was reluctant to do more than refer her for mental health counseling because she was performing valuable analysis of intelligence about Shiite insurgents that was helping to save soldiers lives.

After her arrest, Ms. Manning was flagged as a suicide risk and held in the Marine Corps brig in Quantico, Va. She was placed under austere conditions that the military said were necessary to prevent her from harming herself even after military psychologists said it was no longer necessary. A military court-martial judge later ruled the move had been unlawful, and after a high-level Pentagon intervention, she was transferred to Fort Leavenworth.

After her conviction, she announced that she wanted to be known as Chelsea Manning and referred to by female pronouns. In 2014, she legally changed her name from Bradley to Chelsea. In response to a federal lawsuit, the military began letting her receive hormone therapy, but houses her with male inmates and does not let her grow her hair.

Ms. Mannings 35-year sentence is the longest ever imposed for providing government secrets to the public. The documents she disclosed, which made her a hero to open-government activists, included diplomatic cables from American embassies around the world, incident logs from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, intelligence dossiers about Guantnamo Bay detainees and a video of a helicopter airstrike in Baghdad in which two Reuters journalists were killed. WikiLeaks made them public, working with various news organizations, including The Times.

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Chelsea Manning Tried Committing Suicide a Second Time in ...