Witness | US v Pfc. Manning, First Lieutenant Elizabeth Fields, Special Security Representative (SSR) for the T-SCIF, S2 Section, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division

posted December 8, 2011

UPDATE POST COURT-MARTIAL

United States v. Pfc. Manning was conducted in de facto secrecy. The public was not granted contemporaneous access to court filings or rulings during her trial. In addition to reporting on her trial, I transcribed the proceedings, reconstructed the censored appellate list, and un-redact any publicly available documentation, in order to foster public comprehension of her unprecedented trial.

As a result of a lawsuit against the military judge and the Military District of Washington brought by the Center for Constitutional Rights, as well as my own FOIA requests and research, an official court record for US v. Pfc. Manning was released seven months after her trial. That record is not complete.

The official trial docket is published HERE and the entire collection of documents is text searchable at usvmanning.org.

*During the pretrial proceedings, court-martial and sentencing of Pfc. Manning, Chelsea requested to be identified as Bradley and addressed using the male pronoun. In a letter embargoed for August 22, 2013 Chelsea proclaimed that she is female and wished to be addressed from that moment forward as Chelsea E. Manning.

General Description

First Lieutenant Elizabeth Fields is mentioned in the Article 32 Pretrial testimony of Specialist Jihrleah Showman and Captain Casey Martin (married name Fulton), Assistant S2, S2 Section, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division. Specialist Jihrleah Showman testified that 1st Lt. Elizabeth Fields ” was the Security Manager before her.” Captain Casey Martin (married name Fulton) testified Lt. Elizabeth Fields and Master Sergeant Paul Adkins (now Sergeant First Class due to an administrative action) were “responsible to make sure derogs are processed.”

First Lieutenant Elizabeth Fields provided a sworn statement for the Secretary of the Army’s 15-6 investigation into the alleged unauthorized disclosures. Defense’s account of 1st Lt. Elizabeth Fields’s sworn statement is contained in their Defense Request To Compel Witnesses.

The Government objected to the defense request for the testimony of 1st Lt. Elizabeth Fields, Special Security Representative (SSR) for the T-SCIF at Fort Drum, NY for the S2 Section, Second Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division at the December 2011 Article 32 Pretrial Hearing, stating his testimony was “not relevant to the Article 32 investigation and will only serve to distract from the relevant issues.“

While there is no official public record of Almanza’s denial of this witness’ testimony, 1st Lt. Elizabeth Fields, Special Security Representative (SSR) for the T-SCIF at Fort Drum, NY, Second Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division did not appear during any open session of the Article 32 Pretrial Hearing. The public record shows that at least fourteen witnesses were granted to defense for the Article 32 Pretrial Hearing. In Lt. Col. Almanza’s ruling on the Defense Request for Article 32 Witnesses, 12 witnesses were granted to the defense, 10 of whom were also requested by the Government. Defense said in open Court on December 16, 2011, that Lt. Col. Almanza granted two additional witnesses to defense that morning.

No. 23 on the December 2, 2011 Defense Request for Article 32 Witnesses

XXXXXXXXXX [1st Lt. Elizabeth Fields] as the Special Security Representative (SSR) for the T-SCIF and part of the Sunni Team, She will testify that she only received one hour of training at l0th MTN to be the SSR for the T-SCIF. Her training covered the basic rules and regulations for a SCIF at Fort Drum. She will testify that her training did not really cover ensuring the security of a T-SCIF. However, she will testify that she was only the SSR at Fort Drum. When her unit deployed to Iraq, she will testify that then XXXXXXXXXX [Master Sergeant Paul David Adkins (now Sergeant 1st Class due to administrative action)] was the one that worked the security of the T-SCIF and she dealt with security clearances. She will testify that XXXXXXXXXX [Master Sergeant Paul David Adkins (now Sergeant 1st Class due to administrative action)] did not receive any training to be the SSR. However, he just assumed the position under the approval of the S-2 XXXXXXXXXX [Major Cliff Clausen and/or Captain Steven Lim]. She will testify that she believed XXXXXXXXXX [WHO IS THIS?] provided terrible supervisory leadership. She thought he was a terrible leader because the problems within the unit were constantly being ignored. She will testify that it was obvious to everyone that PFC Manning was struggling with mental and emotional issues. However, she will testify that when she tried to deal with the issue and get PFC Manning help, she was told that it was an NCO problem and to stay out of it by XXXXXXXXXX [WHO IS THIS?]. She will also testify that she did not believe that XXXXXXXXXX [Master Sergeant Adkins (now Sergeant First Class due to an administrative action)] had any type of management over the section. She also did not believe that the [Headquarters and Headquarters Company, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division] Company 1SG [A YET UNIDENTIFIED FIRST SERGEANT] cared about the S2 section because they were not co-located. She will testify that she was aware of multiple issues with PFC Manning, but stated that PFC Manning stayed in the T-SCIF because XXXXXXXXXX [WHO IS THIS?] said that we needed personnel. She will testify that she believed that there was a lack of leadership across the board. She will testify that as leaders they should have pushed harder from the NCOs to the Officers. She will testify that she was puzzled why PFC Manning was not removed from the T-SCIF after previous behavior incidents that occurred between him and XXXXXXXXXX Sergeant (former Specialist) Daniel Padgett] in December 2009. She will testify that it was simply accepted that people brought in CDs and DVDs into the T- SCIF. She believed that there was no unit training at 2/10 that focused on T-SCIF operations during the deployment.