Court-Martial Trial Practice

Behind the barricades:  infiltration of Navy court-room San Diego – success, Article 39A – complete, exfiltration Navy court-room San Diego – success.

NewsFirst5.com reports:

Spc. Jordan Peters is charged with two counts of involuntary manslaughter, one count of driving under the influence, one count of reckless endangerment and one count of assault. The charges stem from a vehicle crash last February that killed two soldiers.

We read and hear a lot about cyberwarfare.  Here is a link to an article that raises the question – is the use of certain cyberwarfare techniques a law of war violation?  And answers in the negative.

Could deploying Stuxnet be a war crime?

WHIO reports:

A 27-year Air Force veteran has pleaded guilty to 13 counts of sexual misconduct in his court martial at Scott Air Force Base in Illinois.  Chief Master Sergeant William Gurney still faces trial on 5 other counts against him.

NY Daily News reports:

NIMJ has posted a GAO report on the “costs” of implementing DOD’s homosexual conduct policy.

But beyond that specific issues there are interesting charts which show the prevalence of administrative discharges and reasons for discharge for FY2004 through FY2009.  Look at Tables 13-15.

Howard Bashman at howappealing found this article.

Today’s edition of The Montreal Gazette contains an article that begins, "When can a lawyer criticize a judge? Lawyers — as well as judges and professional orders representing lawyers across Canada — will be closely watching the outcome of a Supreme Court of Canada case that begins next Wednesday."

To me this was a no brainer.  This —

Dayton Daily News reports:

Court-martial proceedings have arrived in southwestern Illinois for an Ohio-based chief master sergeant accused of sexually harassing 10 female subordinates.

Prior postings on this case are here.

United States v. Soto is decided and the findings and sentence have been set aside.

It was always my view that “terms” of a pretrial that clued the judge into sentence limits ought to go in the sentence Part II portion of the pretrial.  So for example, a BCD striker clause seems like it ought to be in the Part II.  But not according to CAAF.  If the MJ knows up front there’s a BCD striker requirement then she knows there’s no BCD protection and likely other protections.

CAAF doesn’t say you can’t have such a provision, they kick that can down the road in footnote 1., they say it must be disclosed to the MJ during the Green/King inquiry.

Air Force Times reports:

A promiscuous Air Force technical sergeant was convicted Wednesday of exposing multiple unwitting sex partners to HIV at swinger parties.

He has been sentenced to eight years reports Military.com.

You’ll remember the Reserve O-6 who had some public comments about the usefulness of management by PowerPoint.

Thanks to my colleague at futurelawyer.com