Right, but the primary reason you would support Manning is because you believe the government is in the wrong and that the $256k is considered coercive because the government is using it to pressure her into doing something that isn't in her best interest in regards to a fair trial.
So the goal would be to pay lawyer fees to fight the $256k of fees.
No she hasn't. That is, she was not made immune to incarceration and confiscation of money - which is what the federal state did to her. She was only immune from prosecution about what she says in her testimony. However... she had already been prosecuted for her actions and did a lot of jail time.
Plus, you don't rat people out because you've been granted personal "immunity".
The link above goes to paying her legal team. Her fine will come from her own funds separately. Your lawyers don't pay your fines, you do personally.
Ideally, her legal team or someone would put up a separate fundraiser for her fine, that goes specifically to paying that. I for one would definitely donate.
In France, during the yellow vest protest, there was a similar online crowd-founding for a boxer who did fight with a cop and was sentenced to pay a fine.
From what I remember, with some crowd-funding platforms, it is against Terms Of Service to rise money to pay sentence's fine. I do not remember if laws in France forbid it or if it's for other reasons.
I imagine it's going to be hard for her to find employment, and if she doesn't pay those fines she'll eventually end up in custody with even more fines.
I wouldn't think the length of imprisonment would be longer than it would take to see a judge in most cases.
The cycle I'm referencing is usually fail to pay your fines, at some point dependent upon jurisdiction and familiarity to the court, arrest warrant is issued, if caught you are arrested and taken to jail to be held until you see a judge, accrue more fines, possibly repeat.
I'm not making statements that this will happen, only that it absolutely can and does happen to people.
It's generally hard for trans people to find employment, period -- and I doubt she has meaningful job skills given her extended imprisonment. That said, trans people rally around our own so she shouldn't have trouble surviving; but whether or not that life is existentially fulfilling is another question...
Also, I don't think it's legal to jail someone over unpaid debt (though many states will certainly try). They can do all sorts of things like garnish your wages, but federal courts don't throw people in jail for being poor.
While I definitely agree on the trans front, it's also hard for infamous people to find employment, and sometimes impossible for felons. Mixing all of those builds seemingly insurmountable hurdles.
Son of Sam laws, and their derivatives, can also prevent her from monetizing her story easily, if at all.
You can absolutely be jailed for not paying court ordered fines; that's often how the legal system in the US works for the poor and marginalized. It's a nasty cycle. Punishment fines also can't be discharged in bankruptcy, afaik.
> It's generally hard for trans people to find employment, period -- and I doubt she has meaningful job skills given her extended imprisonment.
She's a celebrity speaker with a large upper-middle-class fan base, so as long as their interest doesn't go somewhere else she’ll probably do okay.
Of course, if her opponents don't do their part to keep her in the news, the attention will wane.
> Also, I don't think it's legal to jail someone over unpaid debt
It's not. Though it's quite possible she could now be charged with criminal contempt and imprisoned for that.
She could also be jailed for refusing to pay her existing debt (but not for inability to pay.) But note that isn't always an easy line to draw, and a lot of time the latter is dressed up as the former, though with sufficient litigation (which someone has to fund) to challenge it, higher courts may reverse it.
> She's a celebrity speaker with a large upper-middle-class fan base, so as long as their interest doesn't go somewhere else she’ll probably do okay.
She's also very not-ok (3 suicide attempts, including 1 last week) after what she's been through. Being trans is traumatizing enough in itself, and I can't imagine what it was like for her in a military prison. If I were her, I would want an extended period of time away from the limelight.
You cannot legally be jailed for failing to pay a debt, even to the legal system; you can be jailed for refusing to do so, but that requires ability to pay.
Based on my observations of poor people with debts at local courthouses, this is a strictly theoretical legal position. It is a fact that poor people are charged money for their time spent in local jails. It is a further fact that when they can't pay those bills they are jailed again, and charged more money for this additional time in jail. I'm in Missouri, so if you want more details about this you can see anything about Ferguson.
It's not strictly theoretical, though it is, like all laws, imperfectly implemented, and particularly problematic because those to whom it is not properly applied also naturally lack the means to mount an effective legal challenge without outside aid, making it less likely that abusess will be corrected by higher courts than would be the case otherwise.
But that's not a “the law allows imprisoning you for inability to pay a fine” problem but a “the legal rights of the poor are ineffectively protected in our system” problem, which is a different and much broader problem.
> I'm in Missouri, so if you want more details about this you can see anything about Ferguson.
As I recall, practices of this kind were prominent in the catalog of violations of federal Constitutional and statutory rights compiled in the DoJ investigations around Ferguson that descended after the Michael Brown incident and associated protests, sure.
So going down to basics you have a system that effectively ruins people for the f.. of it and without ANY repercussions for guilty. Dress it any like you want but the result are what matters. USSR also had nice constitution.
That it is. Viewing the current legal system, in the US, through the lens of idealism does a huge disservice to reality.
The legal system has and will treat a single mother who works full time but just can't make the agreed upon payments differently than a felon that can't get a job that pays enough to cover costs of living and their fines; especially if the felon is in the same jurisdiction and has seen the same judge before. I've seen it several times in person, have been told about it by people that it's happened to, in several states.
Yes, you can. A simple google search would show you this. Criminal punishment debt is not the same as credit based debt. It's all about the jurisdiction, and your previous presence in the court; particularly with the same judges.
Yes, they don't have to jail you, but they absolutely can and do.
Yes, of course. Just as the government cannot put a lien on your bank account for saying you are going to buy Manning a sandwich or pay her rent.
The sibling link to her legal defense fund is presumably structured this way - the money goes directly to her attorney who holds it in trust specifically for her legal defense. She never has any control over it, and so she cannot be compelled to use it to pay the fine.
