On May 17th, Chelsea Manning will be freed from her time at Fort Leavenworth. Residents of the town have mixed feelings.
Manning was granted a commuted sentence by President Barack Obama on Tuesday, allowing her to leave Fort Leavenworth 28 years early.
“I believe intelligence is not anything he was ever interested in and I believe this is a bad representation of what should have happened," said resident Michael Turner.
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"If it hadn't been for his mental state, I'd say put him away forever, but with release, I don't see anything wrong with releasing him or her," said resident Arley Cordonier,
“I’ve lived here most of my life and for the most part, the people on the Fort stay with the Fort and people in town stay in town," added Bobby Salyers. "Most people get out and they want to get as far away as possible, so we don’t have to worry about them hanging around.”
Manning, who is a transgender woman, was sentenced to 35 years after pleading guilty to publicly releasing hundreds of thousand of military documents detailing sensitive information.
Wikileaks published the paperwork and videos online.
Manning served as an Army intelligence analyst in the U.S. Army as Bradley Manning.
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Lexi Sutter can be reached at lexi.sutter@kshb.com.
