Naval Station Norfolk is located in the Sewells Point area of Norfolk, Virginia, near the historic site of the Civil War battle between the Monitor and the Merrimac. It is the largest naval complex in the world and the primary base supporting the readiness of the U.S. Atlantic Fleet. The installation provides facilities and services that enable mission accomplishment for deployed and shore-based commands. Every ship and aviation unit operating on the East Coast connects through Norfolk for logistics, maintenance, or operational control. The base covers more than 4,000 acres, with extensive piers, hangars, and training areas that support more than 70 ships and submarines, along with multiple carrier air wings based at Chambers Field.
Note: For cases in this area, our firm represents Sailors and Coast Guard members facing UCMJ or disciplinary proceedings connected to commands in the Hampton Roads region. We do not represent dependents, veterans, or civilian contractors.
The region surrounding the base is known collectively as Hampton Roads. It includes the cities of Norfolk, Portsmouth, Virginia Beach, Chesapeake, Newport News, Hampton, and Suffolk. The area is home to more than a million residents, many of whom are active-duty service members or civilian employees supporting the Navy. Portsmouth contains the Norfolk Naval Shipyard, one of the oldest and most important shipyards in the country, responsible for refits, overhauls, and nuclear maintenance. To the north, Naval Weapons Station Yorktown handles ordnance storage and loading for Atlantic Fleet ships. Joint Expeditionary Base Little Creek–Fort Story in Virginia Beach provides amphibious training and supports special warfare units. These commands operate in close coordination and form one of the most extensive maritime defense complexes in the world.
Daily activity at Norfolk reflects the constant cycle of fleet operations. Ships return from deployment, undergo maintenance, and prepare for new assignments while air wings train for carrier integration. Chambers Field supports both fixed-wing and rotary-wing operations, linking naval aviation to the broader Atlantic theater. The base also hosts numerous tenant commands responsible for logistics, personnel, medical, and administrative support across the fleet. These overlapping responsibilities create a distinctive environment where command authority, jurisdiction, and legal oversight are shared among multiple commands and regions.
Legal and disciplinary issues at Norfolk often arise from the size and complexity of the command structure. NCIS investigations may involve personnel from different ships or commands, and proceedings can originate on base, aboard ship, or at associated installations throughout Hampton Roads. Allegations involving sexual misconduct, fraternization, or financial irregularities are common. Off-base incidents in nearby cities frequently lead to command involvement, and coordination with civilian law enforcement is routine. Administrative separations, non-judicial punishment, and court-martial actions occur regularly due to the scale of the population and the number of commands present.
A dedicated Office of Special Trial Counsel (OSTC) operates at Naval Station Norfolk. The OSTC is the Navy’s independent military justice organization responsible for prosecuting “covered offenses,” which include crimes involving serious personal violence and sexual misconduct. It reports directly to the Secretary of the Navy and is staffed by Special Trial Counsel: experienced judge advocates with authority separate from the traditional command structure. These counsel decide whether a case involving a covered offense proceeds to court-martial, independent of any commanding officer.
Covered offenses under the OSTC system include violations of several punitive articles of the UCMJ, such as Articles 117a, 118, 119, 119a, 120, 120a, 120b, 120c, 125, 128b, 130, 132, and 134. These encompass crimes ranging from murder and domestic violence to sexual assault, stalking, and the wrongful distribution of intimate images. The presence of a district OSTC office at Norfolk means that many of the Navy’s most serious cases originate or are managed from this location, and coordination between commands and prosecutors is frequent.
Our attorneys have extensive experience with Norfolk’s command structure, its regional legal network, and the procedures of the Office of Special Trial Counsel. We also represent Coast Guard personnel stationed in the region and those whose cases are handled in the federal courthouse in Norfolk. Experience with the unique mix of naval and Coast Guard jurisdiction in this area is essential for effective defense representation.
Article 120 Defense: Core Principles for Norfolk
No, You Don’t Recall it Like it Was Just Yesterday
- Recollection is reconstruction, not recording.
- Each time a story is told, it changes. Alcohol, stress, and suggestion reshape what people remember until false details feel true.
- Blackouts erase memory, not consciousness. What fills those gaps later is often imagination, not fact.
- Confidence doesn’t equal accuracy. A witness can be certain and completely wrong. Emotion proves suffering, not guilt.
- The defense must teach the panel to separate feelings from proof. Science and logic counter sympathy and fear.
Bias Shapes Every Case
- Confirmation bias makes people see what they expect. Hindsight bias turns normal behavior into warning signs after the fact.
- “Why would she lie?” isn’t the right question. People lie for advantage, leverage, or self-protection. There are many reasons, and you should make a list of those that might apply to your case.
- But false claims aren’t always lies. Sometimes they’re borrowed certainty, reinforced by friends, command figures, and advocates who shape the story before it ever reaches court.
Credibility Comes From Composure
- Military courtrooms reward professionalism, not performance. The panel and judge respond to restraint, not theatrics.
- The best cross-examination is methodical, not combative. The goal is revelation, not destruction.
- A conversational tone lets witnesses contradict themselves. Silence can be more effective than any question.
- Skilled attorneys shift between modes without losing control.
- Liars collapse under patience.
- Witnesses can be ethically guided to undermine their own testimony.
Alcohol Cases Favor the Defense
- Memory gaps from drinking create openings. Blackout cases are stronger than pass-out cases because the mind records fragments that can be tested for consistency and logic.
- Prosecution narratives break down where inference replaces fact. Every guess and assumption is ground to fight on.
Consent and Mistake of Fact
- Mistake of fact is the law’s recognition that honest misunderstanding isn’t guilt.
- Reasonableness is judged by what a sober person would have perceived, not by the accused’s intoxication.
- Mutual drinking doesn’t create mutual blame.
- Continuing after visible confusion, sickness, or hesitation is never reasonable.
- Consent is required in every encounter, even in long-term relationships.
- Belief about someone’s age must be genuinely reasonable based on all available information. The law defends honest error, not convenient assumptions.
Working With OSTC
- Early engagement with the OSTC creates opportunities.
- Present exculpatory material before referral. Waiting for trial means missing the only chance to stop charges from moving forward.
- OSTC prosecutors want to win. They’ll dismiss weak cases if given a credible reason to do so.
- Never antagonize the judge or panel. They’ll punish the accused for the attorney’s mistakes.
- Professionalism from the defense raises the tone of the entire proceeding and the accused benefits from the halo effect. The accused contributes by being composed and cordial to everyone at all times.
How to Cross-Examine Child Witnesses
- Child witnesses activate protective instincts in the courtroom. Never appear to bully or intimidate, even when the testimony is false.
- Challenge the investigation or the motivation, not the child. Expose flawed interviewing techniques, contamination from parents, or delays in reporting through evidence and logic, not aggression.
- Composure is everything. Losing control or arguing with a child destroys credibility instantly.
- The panel’s empathy must shift from pity to fairness. That requires objectivity, situational awareness, and the ability to read the room at every moment.
Hiring Counsel From Beyond Hampton Roads
The Hampton Roads region has a number of civilian military lawyers who advertise experience with UCMJ cases. Many of them are former Navy or Marine Corps judge advocates who remained in the area after retirement. Some served for decades in staff or advisory positions before opening small private practices, while others left active duty after a few years and built local offices around the bases they once supported. They are competent to handle general military matters and understand the language of the system.
Trial work is different. Not every lawyer who has served as a JAG has spent time defending serious felony-level cases in a contested courtroom. Many who now market themselves as military defense attorneys have limited experience with the kind of evidence, witnesses, and command dynamics that define an OSTC prosecution. The Office of Special Trial Counsel now controls the Navy’s most serious cases (sexual assault, domestic violence, and other violent-crime allegations) and those prosecutions demand courtroom skill that goes beyond administrative work or advisory duties.
Our firm has focused on UCMJ defense since 2006, representing Sailors and Coast Guard members in Norfolk and at other installations across the Eastern Seaboard. During our active-duty service, we tried courts-martial from New England through the Gulf Coast and continued that work after entering civilian practice. We have handled cases under every major revision of the UCMJ and throughout the transition to the OSTC system. Norfolk and the surrounding commands remain a regular part of our caseload.
Most military justice cases do not require in-person meetings until the later stages of a court-martial. Discovery, strategy, and client communication can be handled securely from anywhere. If travel becomes necessary for hearings or trial, associated costs are discussed in advance and kept transparent. The real question for any service member is not proximity, but capability.
Local counsel may be close to the gate, but distance does not measure experience. For the cases prosecuted by the OSTC, a defense team with decades of courtroom practice and national reach offers a different level of representation. Our firm provides that depth, combining two senior litigators with more than twenty years of focused military and federal trial experience.
Watch Out for Hidden Trial Fee Tricks
Many firms advertise a flat trial fee, but the agreement includes a minimum buried in the fine print. The quoted fee covers only a set number of trial days, usually three to five, and anything beyond that gets billed separately. Those additional days can run $3,000 or more per day, or revert to hourly billing. What initially looks like a fixed price turns out to be a minimum that grows as the trial proceeds.
Our trial fees work differently. When we quote a fee for a trial, that amount covers the entire proceeding from start to finish, whether it takes two days or two weeks. The fee does not change based on how long the trial lasts. It also includes travel days. Time spent in transit, preparing at the hotel, or coordinating with appointed counsel is already factored into the quoted price.
The only costs beyond the trial fee are direct expenses: airfare, lodging, and rental car. Those are actual out-of-pocket costs, not legal fees disguised as reimbursements. The structure is designed to eliminate surprises and keep the financial terms clear from the beginning. No hidden bonus days. No asterisks. No revised invoices halfway through trial.
With Our Firm: Human Contact From the First Call
When you reach out, the number you call rings to our own phones. There’s no receptionist, call center, or chatbot between you and your lawyers. The same people who wrote this site are the ones who read your email, return your call, and take your case. Communication stays personal from start to finish.
CSAM Defense Blueprint
Challenging Proof of Possession
Finding CSAM on a device doesn’t establish that the accused knowingly possessed it. Defense starts by identifying who else had access to the computer or phone, whether files arrived through intentional downloads or automatic syncing, and whether the accused deleted or reported the material as soon as it was discovered. Shared devices, compromised networks, and malware all raise reasonable doubt about knowing possession.
Hash Value Reliability
Hash values function as digital fingerprints, but they aren’t foolproof. Defense counsel must confirm that hash values were correctly generated, that files remained intact during forensic imaging, and that the comparison process was executed without error. Mistakes in evidence handling, software glitches, or investigator shortcuts can undermine the government’s case. Defense also examines whether the search authorization was overbroad or whether investigators accepted NCMEC reports at face value instead of conducting independent analysis.
Your Knowledge Is the Core Issue
Every CSAM case turns on what the accused actually knew. Were files kept in clearly labeled folders with explicit names, or were they buried in hidden directories with system-generated labels? Did the accused open the files multiple times, or did they appear once and remain untouched? The government must prove wrongful knowledge beyond a reasonable doubt, and this element is where many cases fail.
Expert Testimony Is Critical
Digital forensics experts reconstruct device activity to determine whether files were accessed deliberately, whether timestamps were altered, and whether remote intrusion or automated software placed material on the device without the user’s involvement. These experts provide the technical foundation for challenging the government’s narrative.
Forensic psychologists evaluate mental health history, cognitive function, and trauma background. Their assessments inform mitigation arguments and support treatment-based sentencing alternatives. Both types of experts are necessary, not optional, particularly when the goal is avoiding maximum punishment in the event of conviction.
Excluding Victim Impact Material
When NCMEC matches a file to known CSAM, the submission often includes investigative materials from the original victim identification. These records might contain police reports, recorded interviews, or victim statements detailing the harm caused by the original abuse. While emotionally compelling, these materials are hearsay and legally improper in a possession case.
The accused charged with possession has no connection to the original crime against the victim. The government cannot use third-party investigative files or victim accounts to establish knowledge, intent, or culpability in the possession charge. These materials exceed the evidentiary boundaries of a possession prosecution and should be excluded unless the government presents a live witness available for foundation and cross-examination.
Excluding this material restricts the government’s sentencing case significantly. Without victim impact evidence from NCMEC files, prosecutors must rely solely on the technical facts of the possession charge: number of files, access logs, and device forensics. Defense counsel should file motions to exclude these materials early, maintaining the legal distinction between the accused’s alleged possession and the separate crimes committed by others. It is common for the government to require a waiver of hearsay objections in any CSAM case where there is a plea deal limiting punishment.
Civilian Military Lawyer for Your Case at Norfolk
If you are stationed at Naval Station Norfolk or elsewhere in Hampton Roads and facing investigation, court-martial, or administrative action under the UCMJ, call us at 800-319-3134 for a confidential case review. We have defended Sailors throughout the Eastern Seaboard for two decades and understand the command structure, NCIS investigation process, and OSTC prosecution system at Norfolk. Don’t face the Navy’s largest legal complex without experienced counsel. Call now and speak directly with the attorneys who will defend you.