Archives for August 2016

Your script, simplified:  What exactly am I being accused of? That’s not true. I didn’t do it. I’m not going to talk to you, I want a lawyer. If the military suspects you of committing a crime, eventually the investigators will ask you to talk. The conversation won’t be on your turf. It’ll be at their office, behind locked and guarded doors, in a tiny, windowless, clockless interrogation room. You’ll be directed where to sit. The scene and the method are scripted, staged, and calibrated for maximum psychological effect. It’s not a conversation, it’s psychological warfare. And it can last all day and night if you let it. Update, April 2026: Three recent cases (two from 2026 and one from 2017 that keeps coming up) show […]

Myth 1: A COURT-MARTIAL is required to be a fair fight Truth: From the beginning of the case, the court martial defendant faces huge disadvantages. The government has unlimited resources at a court martial, but the appointed defense counsel’s office receives very little funding. The government will have at least two prosecutors at a court martial, while the defendant is typically entitled to have only one appointed attorney. The prosecution has an entire office of investigators, but the defense is entitled to none. The prosecution can afford to travel and have any witness it wants to the court martial in order to testify against the defendant, but the defense needs to get the government’s approval to fund any defense witness travel. The prosecution gets to […]