Video of Chelsea Manning “wellness check” highlights threat posed by police to mentally ill in US
By
Matthew Verhoven
6 June 2018
Security camera video obtained and published by the Intercept shows that four Montgomery County police officers broke into whistleblower Chelsea Manning’s apartment in Bethesda, Maryland last month with guns drawn.
Prepared as if responding to a high-stakes hostage crisis or a barricaded armed individual, the four officers were performing a routine procedure known as a “wellness check,” carried out when police receive a tip indicating someone may be experiencing a mental health crisis and is at risk of harming themselves or others.
On May 27, Manning posted a number of since-deleted tweets which indicated to friends and followers that she was at risk of harming herself. Receiving a number of calls apparently warranting the entry into her home, a Montgomery County officer is seen using a master key to open the door and allow entry to four officers, three with hand guns drawn and one with a Taser.
Manning was fortunately absent from her home that day. The officers, armed and ready to aid and abet a suicide-by-cop, posed a serious threat of murdering in cold blood the former political prisoner and one-time Army intelligence analyst who heroically leaked information of US war crimes to the public via WikiLeaks.
In a comment given to the Intercept, Manning said of the video, “This is what a police state looks like. Guns drawn during a ‘wellness’ check.”
In a stroke of luck, Manning avoided execution at the hands of the police, however thousands more are not nearly so fortunate and are slaughtered in the streets, in their homes, in their neighborhoods, with the pursuit of justice endlessly stonewalled for those who survive and…