Court-Martial Trial Practice

Navy Times recently interviewed the Director of NCIS. Here is a question I found interesting and thought I’d share. Q. There have been a number of recent cases in which inspector general investigations concluded NCIS agents weren’t following procedures. What are you doing to improve that? A. I think if we have needed to we…

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6g63EE1Y2e8] On 29 August 2014, the Inspector General, U.S. Department of Defense issue a report, Evaluation of DoD Compliance with the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act. In connection with the U.S. sex offender registry’s, there is now quite a robust amount of research that seems to label the idea as ineffective. The worst…

“Adolescents, more than adults, tend to discount the future and to afford greater weight to the short-term consequences of decisions.” Kim Taylor-Thompson, States of Mind/States of Development, 14 STAN. L. & POL’Y REV. 143, 154 (2003). How often do I think of this principle (cited to in The Virginia Lawyer, and United States v. Berry),…

Test

From DefenseNews: Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., told reporters on Tuesday that Senate and House Armed Services Committee leaders want to finish the compromise version of the 2015 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) by Friday. There will likely be no floor amendments, Levin said, largely because there are few remaining days…

I came across a piece entitled, “We Love the Pentagon’s ‘Encylopedia of Ethical Failure’” which is on medium.com. The piece notes what we have all seen that the last few years have seen many ethical challenges for the military. Likely we know more about the specific cases because of The Internet and Google. Individually, the…

I was reading Unwashed Advocate today, and thought I would repeat his good advice on how best to make a motion or objection at trial. I have a couple of additional thoughts, but otherwise his is good advice. He says, and I quote extensively: However, when it comes to making a motion, or stating an…

Global Miliary Justice Reform blog brings us news of action in Europe in regard to a U.S. deserter seeking refugee status in Germany – he was avoiding deployment to the AOR. On 1 January 1977, President Carter pardoned a large number of civilians who had gone to Canada to avoid the draft. The pardon did…

I was at a conference this weekend on global issues of military justice. Again this lingering issue of transparency came up. My friend and colleague Gene Fidell at Global Military Justice Reform, has found a couple of gems. You can find information about the internal workings of the Army trial judiciary at this link, or…

Another of my ongoing noting of civilian cases which reference or rely upon military appellate decisions. I do this partly because it is an example of transparency and why it is needed in the military. When using Lexis or other search functions you are going to come up with military cases – if you have…