New Cases Category Archives — Court-Martial Trial Practice Blog Published by International Military Lawyer

Defining meaning from words in a statute

September 24, 2023 | The Law Office of Philip D. Cave

Generally

When deciding what a word or term in a statute means, the rule of statutory interpretation is to give the word or term its plain and ordinary meaning. This is known as the plain meaning rule. If the word or term is clear and unambiguous, then the court will not look beyond the text of the statute to determine its meaning. The principal rule is well known to military defense counsel as they prepare a case for trial.

If a word or term is ambiguous, then the court may use other tools of statutory interpretation to determine its meaning. These tools include:

Double Jeopardy

February 6, 2023 | The Law Office of Philip D. Cave

A person being tried at court-martial may have their case dismissed before the members (jury) reach any findings. One way that can happen is when the military judge declares a mistrial. Your military defense lawyer should know what to do if the same charges are re-referred to a court-martial–the prosecution taking a second attempt to convict you.

In a recent case, we had that happen. Unlike uniformed defense counsel, we immediately filed a Writ of Mandamus and Prohibition to prevent the second trial. In Murillo, the Navy-Marine Corps Court of Criminal Appeals has agreed that (1) the court has jurisdiction to hear a Writ petition on this issue and (2) the military judge erred in declaring a mistrial. Thus, the court has dismissed the charges. (As of 5 Feb., we do have to wait to see if the prosecution will appeal that decision.)

The Double Jeopardy Clause‘s whole concept is to protect the accused from a second or subsequent trial on the same charges. The trial itself is what is prohibited. The case is United States v. Murillo, No. 202200132 (N-M Ct. Crim. App. Feb. 3, 2023) (unpub.). The Double Jeopardy Clause is in the Fifth Amendment to the US Constitution, which says, “No person shall . . . be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb . . . . ” The bar against double jeopardy comes from English common law, possibly from Roman law. See F. Ward, Double Jeopardy Clause of the Fifth Amendment. 26 Am. Crim. L. Rev. 1477 (1989). Ward points out that a double jeopardy challenge can be waived by a pretrial agreement because of a Supreme Court decision in United States v. Broce. The author suggests that the military judge should include in their inquiry about whether a waiver is knowing and intentional and whether the defendant understands that waiving the right to trial as part of a plea agreement is also waiving the double jeopardy claim.

Regrettable errors by SVC and TC

May 15, 2022 | The Law Office of Philip D. Cave

Are military law enforcement investigations complete, thorough, and unbiased? It depends. The MCIO leadership and agents will tell you they are. Our experience over the years both as military defense counsel and military prosecutors is that investigations can be incomplete, with leads not followed, evidence not retrieved, and bias in the reports submitted to prosecutors and the command. For example, the reports tend to focus on the bad things about you and ignore what might be helpful to you or your case. We call these instances of biased investigations as affected by confirmation bias. Many times, this doesn’t make a lot of difference. But, in sexual assault cases, a biased and incomplete investigation can lead to problems for the defense—and also for the prosecution. The recent Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces (CAAF) decision in United States v. Horne is an example of how things can go wrong and, in your case, might create serious problems if something similar happened during your investigation.

According to the appellate decisions, the special victim counsel (SVC) and the trial counsel (TC) tried to discourage investigators from interviewing a witness. It worked for a while during which time it appears the witness had a less clear memory of events. The TC thought the witness might have “exculpatory” information which they are obligated to disclose to the defense and which might be helpful to the accused.

The Air Force Court of Criminal Appeals (AFCCA) decision has an extensive review of the facts and circumstances of what happened. Ultimately, the Air Force court and CAAF decided while it was wrong, there was no prejudice against the accused. This case represents how a prepared and aggressive military defense lawyer can help protect you and the record. Sadly, this could happen to you. It is not clear if the SVCs and TCs will learn anything from this case to study their practices and comply with the law and ethics rules. We shall see. The CAAF has these words,

AFCCA published opinion on post-trial (Moreno) delay

September 19, 2020 | The Law Office of Philip D. Cave

14 September 2020, the court issued a published opinion in United States v. Livak, it’s a Moreno case analyzed with the new rules in mind.

Appellant claims that his due process rights were violated when his case was not docketed with this court within 30 days of the convening authority’s action as required by United States v. Moreno, 63 M.J. 129, 142 (C.A.A.F. 2006). Finding no error that resulted in material prejudice to Appellant’s substantial rights, we affirm the findings and sentence.” The court reviews the case considering the new post-trial rules for events at the trial stage. The takeaway point are,

Under the new rules there is no CA action, so Moreno “no longer helps.”

Nullification of PTC credit

June 16, 2019 | The Law Office of Philip D. Cave

An accused in pretrial confinement awaiting trial receives day for day credit toward any sentence to confinement. In the old days, we referred to that as “Allen credit.”

Note, an accused may not automatically get credit for time spent in civilian jail–that needs to be litigated at trial. See United States v. Harris, __ M.J. ___, 2019 CAAF LEXIS 361 (C.A.A.F. 2019).

Which brings us to United States v. Howell, NMCCA, 2019. On appeal, Howell argued that the prosecution wrongly argued to nullify his pretrial confinement credit.

Challenge to sex offender registration in Pennsylvania

July 20, 2017 | The Law Office of Philip D. Cave

As I have argued, for some time in courts-martial, sex offender registration is effectively a punishment in today’s society–despite what legislators and courts say. Well, now we have an interesting decision from the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, in a 3-1 decision, about ex post facto changes to SOR.

[T]he provisions of the state’s sex offender registration law (SORNA) [are] unconstitutional under the state and federal constitutions, according to the majority in Commonwealth v. Muniz held that 1) SORNA’s registration provisions constitute punishment notwithstanding the General Assembly’s identification of the provisions as nonpunitive; 2) retroactive application of SORNA’s registration provisions violates the federal ex post facto clause; and 3) retroactive application of SORNA’s registration provisions also violates the ex post facto clause of the Pennsylvania Constitution.

The bottom line here for me is that various courts are now holding that SOR is punitive. I argue that as the reason an accused should be able to raise SOR requirements in sentencing and that the members should not be given a “Talkington” instruction.

A Hills-Hukill trailer of interest

May 29, 2017 | The Law Office of Philip D. Cave

In United States v. Hills, 75 M.J. 350 (C.A.A.F. 2016), the Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces decided that–

[B]ecause the evidence of the charged sexual misconduct was already admissible in order to prove the offenses at issue, the application of Military Rule of Evidence (M.R.E.) 413 — a rule of admissibility for evidence that would otherwise not be admissible — was error. Neither the text of M.R.E. 413 nor the legislative history of its federal counterpart suggests that the rule was intended to permit the government to show propensity by relying on the very acts the government needs to prove beyond a reasonable doubt in the same case.

M.R.E. 413 otherwise allows the prosecution to introduce evidence of other similar sexual offenses to “prove” a pattern of sexually assaultive behavior. It’s profile evidence (and it’s wrong, but the law allows it). Hills was a members case! As a consequence, the trial and lower appellate courts were limiting Hills to members cases only and refused to apply Hills to judge alone cases–until–

A fence a structure does not make

January 13, 2017 | The Law Office of Philip D. Cave

The Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces has decided United States v. Wilson, __ M.J. __, No. 16-0267/AR, for the appellant. The issue was:

Whether the military judge erred in denying the defense motion for appropriate relief under Rule for Court-Martial 917 where the military judge improperly applied Article 130, housebreaking, to a motor pool.

A unanimous court found that the military judge erred.

New NMCCA cases worth the read

August 12, 2016 | The Law Office of Philip D. Cave

The NMCCA has issued two significant opinions this week, one of which is worth the read while the United States prosecution of Bowe Bergdahl continues.

United States v. Solis, __ M.J. ___ (N-M Ct. Crim. App. 2016). The case presents discussion of continuing issues relating to the nature of the proof and member (jury) instructions in military sexual assault cases. These types of cases, especially where alcohol is involved present complex challenges to the military defense counsel.

Article 120(b)(3)(A) of the UCMJ is unconstitutional because the language “incapable of consenting to the sexual act because she was impaired by . . . alcohol” is unconstitutionally vague.

Prosecutorial practice

April 17, 2016 | The Law Office of Philip D. Cave

In United States v. Mercier, __ M.J. __, No. 20160318 (C.G. Ct. Crim. App. Mar. 18, 2016) the court denied a Government interlocutory appeal of a military judge’s ruling that found that a specification was improperly referred and dismissed the specification without prejudice.

This would seem to be a perfect opportunity to take up, again, two suggested improvements to military law practice.

Let’s have the President issue an Executive Order. The Attorney General of the United States issues several manuals for U. S. Attorneys. This is guidance from HQ intended to assure some measure of uniformity among the U. S. Attorney offices throughout the nation. It is time to impose something akin to the U. S. Attorney’s Manual by executive order (in particular, 9-27.000 – Principles Of Federal Prosecution)?