In the spirit of responsiveness and resilience, this article proposes what the authors believe are three important changes to the Uniform Code of Military Justice: (1) incorporating a “no-adverse-inference” warning into Article 31(b) (the military version of Miranda warnings), (2) transforming the Article 32 pretrial investigation into a preliminary hearing process, and (3) expressly enumerating a limited category of offenses for which civilians accompanying the force in the held can be held responsible. While each proposal focuses on a different aspect of military justice – criminal investigations, pretrial hearings, and trial procedures for civilians accompanying the force – each proposal is connected to a broader theme of ensuring fairness in the system while preserving military readiness.
Full Journal Article Author Details
By: Geoffrey S. Corn
George R. Killam Jr. Chair of Criminal Law and Director of the Center for Military Law and Policy, Texas Tech University School of Law; Lieutenant Colonel, US Army (Retired); Former Special Assistant for Law of War Matters and Chief of the Law of War Branch, Office of the Judge Advocate General, US Army; Chief of International Law for US Army Europe; Professor of International and National Security Law at the US Army Judge Advocate General’s School.
By: Victor M. Hansen
Professor of Law, New England Law, Boston. Professor Hansen served for twenty years in the U.S. Army. He has been a military defense attorney and military prosecutor involved in military capital litigation and, previously, an associate professor at The Judge Advocate General’s Legal Center and School, Charlottesville, Virginia.
