Court-Martial Trial Practice

Spilman reports that: CAAF decided the Navy case of United States v. Andrews, __ M.J. __, No.17-0480/NA (CAAFlog case page) (link to slip op.), on Tuesday, May 22, 2018. Rejecting the Navy-Marine Corps Appellate Government Division’s argument that the failure to object to improper argument at trial waives any error on appeal, CAAF concludes that…

On July 11, 2017 (79 FR 59938-59959), the JSC published a Notice of Proposed Amendments concerning procedure and evidence applicable in trials by court-martial, non-judicial punishment proceedings, and the punitive articles of the Uniform Code of Military Justice as amended by the Military Justice Act of 2016, Division E of the National Defense Authorization Act…

ACCA is back online to the public. On 27 March the court decided United States v. Ellis, a case in which: Appellant asserts that the government’s failure to provide a copy of the accident report was a disclosure violation entitling him to relief on appeal. Appellant assigns both constitutional and non-constitutional error. We address both.…

The NMCCA decided United States v. Kmiecik on 17 May 2018. Kmiecik challenges the military judge’s decision to admit “a signed acknowledgment from the appellant that he understood the Marine Corps’ policy concerning the illegal use of drugs[,]” during sentencing. For trial counsel and judges, and defense counsel. The military judge did not articulate his…

Captain Milott has an interesting article about the use and interpretation of emojis and emoticons in criminal trials when they are part of a text, email, or some other social media message. Many sexual assault courts-martial involve texts and emails between the complaining witness and a suspect–is there a damaging admission, a confession, or something…

Lagano, et al, The Air Force SVC Program: The First Five Years, 44(3) The Reporter 31 (2017). We begin by examining the creation of the SVC program within the Air Force, the expansion of victims’ counsel programs throughout the Department of Defense (DoD), and the growing list of victims’ rights. In the second part of…

The number of exonerations involving wrongdoing by police, prosecutors and other government workers set a record last year, according to a report released on Wednesday. The findings are part of a larger trend that reflects America’s more aggressive attempts to expose and understand the causes of wrongful convictions. The new statistics, released by the National…

Here’s an interesting timeline I came across when reading about the different reasons people lie about sexual assault. International Timeline

In general, motive can be described as an inward emotion, passion, or feeling in a person which “is likely to lead” that person to do an “appropriate act” as “an outlet” for this emotion. See J. Wigmore, A Treatise on the Anglo-American System of Evidence in Trials at Common Law § 117 (3d ed. 1940)…

If you have been falsely accused of a sexual offense you are not alone. I agree and understand that does not make your time in the hot seat happy, comfortable, or certain the truth will out. Here is an article about sexual offense investigation and prosecution in the U.K. U.S. service members will see similarities–sadly.…