Morale

Posted on Sep 10, 2019

Does the ability of your CO to overturn a court marshal conviction matter to you?

Sgt Dennis Gray

1.69K

When an Air Force officer had a sexual assault conviction overturned by his commanding officer and friend, Congress investigated this rule. (2013) The AF Chief of Staff testified that this power was essential for troop morale. I had never heard of it and as far as I knew commanders were the guys that had you court marshaled. Did you know about this and did it affect your morale?

Posted in these groups: Increasingmoraleretention

Morale

Sexual Harassment Imgres

Law

Posted >1 y ago

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Responses: 10

Lt Col Scott Shuttleworth

Edited >1 y ago

Posted >1 y ago

I found out about it when I was a commander. The Commander is the one giving the punishment and preferring charges. The next one in the chain or their boss is the appeal authority. If they think it was unjust or extreme the individual can appeal to them and have it exonerated or carried out. I think it is a good rule for the most part to keep integrity in the UCMJ process against favoritism and it works most of the time...however, it can also go the other way as we have seen.

Maj Marty Hogan
Lt Col Charlie Brown
1stSgt Glenn Brackin
Cpl Craig Morton
SGT David A. 'Cowboy' Groth
COL Mikel J. Burroughs
LTC Stephen C.
CPL Dave Hoover
PO3 Bob McCord
Lt Col John (Jack) Christensen
Sgt Wayne Wood
PVT James Strait
SFC Jack Champion
MSgt David Hoffman
MSgt Stephen Council
SGT Elizabeth Scheck
PO1 H Gene Lawrence
SPC Jon O.
TSgt Joe C.

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Lt Col John (Jack) Christensen

>1 y

Sorry, knew about it as a commander, but if you got convicted by a court martial, you better not be counting on me!

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Lt Col Scott Shuttleworth

>1 y

Lt Col John (Jack) Christensen - My tooughts exactly. If there was enough evidence to convict then something miraculous better come down or it stands.

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Sgt Dennis Gray

>1 y

I totally agree. In the casein question the accused was either a Col, or a LtCol. The one who overturned was a General. His rational was that he had known and worked with the accused and didn't think he would do that. My question though is more about the statement from the commanders in chief, and sec Def that the rule is "essential to morale". How essential can it be if only ranking officers first sgt and other involved in the process know of it. I personally just knew that my CO could give me an article 15. I would have assumed my CO to be like you. Don't count on him.

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Lt Col Scott Shuttleworth

>1 y

Sgt Dennis Gray - I always knew CO's could give Art 15 and prefer charges...never eally understood my judgement as a commander could be overturned by thenext higher grade inthe Chain of Command. Essential to Moral my keester. If I as the CC investigate, find smoking gun evidence, prefer charges and they get awarded and then my boss comes in and overrides it then my morale and my units morale will get crushed. I will say this...most CC's I have known have stood by their Commanders unless there was evicence the commander acted out of emotion and was after somebody versus acted inthe best interest of the unit. Just to say they don't think they would do that is not a reason to overturn...look at the circumstances and the evidence and make a determination and I think overall most do that.

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