Bradley Manning not guilty of aiding the enemy in WikiLeaks case (VIDEO)

GlobalPost
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Three years and dozens of court hearings later, Pfc. Bradley Manning was found not guilty Tuesday of the most serious charge of "aiding the enemy" for leaking classified documents.

While he was acquitted of that charge, Manning was found guilty on six counts of violating the espionage act, in addition to five counts of theft.  

If found guilty of aiding the enemy, Manning could have been sentenced to life in prison. The other convictions could still potentially keep Manning in prison for more than 100 years.

More from GlobalPost: Bradley Manning: Hero, villain or a little bit of both?

Sentencing was scheduled for 9:30 a.m. ET on Wednesday, according to ABC News.

The former Army intelligence analyst has already pleaded guilty to nearly a dozen lesser charges that carry a sentence of up to 20 years behind bars.

WikiLeaks slammed the verdict following Tuesday's hearing, describing the espionage charges as “dangerous national security extremism from the Obama administration.”

Amnesty International had a more measured response:

"The government's priorities are upside down. The US government has refused to investigate credible allegations of torture and other crimes under international law despite overwhelming evidence. Yet they decided to prosecute Mr. Manning who it seems was trying to do the right thing — reveal credible evidence of unlawful behavior by the government," Widney Brown, the rights group’s senior director of international law and policy, told The Associated Press.

Manning, 25, claims he gave more than 700,000 classified documents to Julian Assange's WikiLeaks site in 2010 in order to spark a foreign policy debate and show the public how the United States was fighting its wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Speaking to reporters from the Ecuadorean Embassy in London, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange condemned the verdict, insisting: "It can never be that supplying true information to the public is espionage."

He said the verdict set an unhealthy precedent that could would mark the "end of national security journalism in the United States." (Watch a video of Assange's full remarks below.)

More from GlobalPost: WikiLeaks: Bradley Manning pleads guilty to 10 of 22 charges

In February, Manning testified that he took "full responsibility" for his actions.

"I felt I accomplished something that would allow me to have a clear conscience," he said.

Prosecutors have argued that Manning is a traitor, pointing to evidence indicating some of the documents he leaked ended up in the hands of Osama bin Laden.

More than two dozen supporters awaited the verdict outside the court in Fort Meade, Maryland

"We are very proud of Bradley," read one sign.

A rally in support of Manning was planned Tuesday night in Washington, DC.

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