Judge in Manning Wikileaks trial rules crowdfunded stenographers should get permanent court access

Photo: Bradley Manning, via standwithbrad.org

Huge news from the Freedom of the Press Foundation's Trevor Timm:

Bradley Manning's defense lawyer David Coombs brought up our crowd-funded stenographers in court during the morning session, and we're happy to say, once and for all, that the judge ruled the government must make permanent accomodations for the stenographers. The stenographers were in the media room yesterday on press passes borrowed from other media organizations.

The full transcript can be read here.

After the judge acknowledged the letter signed by over twenty major news organizations requesting the court issue to permanent press passes to the stenographers because of the limited public access to the trial, the defense argued the stenographers furthered Manning's First and Sixth Amendment rights:

Here are each day's court transcripts, filed from the courtroom by the stenographers.

Read the rest here. Kevin Gosztola has a related report here, from yesterday.

(Disclosure: I'm a proud board member on the FotPF)