Yes. However, which board you apply to depends on what type of court-martial sentenced you to a discharge. If you received a bad conduct discharge from a special court-martial within the last 15 years, you may apply to the appropriate service Discharge Review Board. If you received a punitive discharge from a general court-martial, you … Read more
On July 8, 2013, The Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces (CAAF) held in U.S. v. Porter that a servicemember’s drug testing report showing positives for both marijuana and cocaine should have been deemed inadmissible at trial under the Confrontation Clause of the Constitution. The reason the admission of the drug testing report was … Read more
A case that is currently being appealed to The Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces (CAAF) has caught my attention. The case is U.S. v. Thomas and involves an officer who faced court-martial charges that alleged violations of Article 134. The court-martial charges were defectively written because they did not allege in the writing … Read more
Mr. Cassara represented an Army major who was pending a show cause Board at Fort Hood, Texas after receiving a GOMOR. The show cause notice had already been published, and the officer was pending a board date. Mr. Cassara filed a detailed rebuttal of the allegations in the GOMOR, which was the sole reason for … Read more
Mr. Cassara recently represented an Army officer who received a DWI off base. As is standard, she received a GOMOR. It is fairly standard that a GOMOR of this sort is filed in the officer’s permanent fiche, which is seen by promotion boards. But Mr. Cassara was able to convince the commanding general that there … Read more
On June 24, 2013 the Army Court of Criminal Appeals in U.S. v. St. John determined that a servicemember’s plea in a court-martial to both indecent liberties with a child and indecent exposure for the same incident was duplicative. It is often difficult to understand Congress’ full intent with regards to Article 120 of the … Read more
According to the Army Times, “brain scans of veterans with symptoms of Gulf War illness show neurological differences between those who deployed to the region in 1990 and 1991 and a control group.” Some veterans of the Gulf War have complained of having many different symptoms following their deployment. These symptoms include, fatigue, memory loss, … Read more
On 21 June 2013, in United States v. Eller, the Air Force Court of Criminal Appeals denied a government appeal of a military judge’s decision to grant a challenge for cause based on a court-martial panel member’s knowledge of President Obama’s influential comments about sexual assault as well as her opinion about whether verbal consent … Read more
On May 7, 2013, President Obama stated, “[t]he bottom line is: I have no tolerance for this…I expect consequences…So I don’t just want more speeches or awareness programs or training, but ultimately folks look the other way. If we find out somebody’s engaging in this, they’ve got to be held accountable — prosecuted, stripped of … Read more
According to the Stars and Stripes, Navy Judge Commander Marcus Fulton recently ruled during two pretrial hearings in court martials, U.S. v. Johnson and U.S. v. Fuentes, that President Obama’s public comments in May 2013 would unduly influence panel members and/or military judge sitting on the court-martials to discharge the Sailors accused of sexual assault. … Read more