Air Force Sexual Assault Cases Against Officers: Outcomes and Sentences

Trends › By Offense › Article 120 › Officers

Based on 20 cases · 2016–2025 · Air Force records · data updated October 24, 2026

Officer Panels Heard Most Cases

Officer panels heard 16 of these cases. A military judge alone decided 3, and no enlisted panel heard any. Members heard 84% of the cases with the forum listed, compared with 61% in all Air Force Article 120 cases.

Among the contested cases, members heard 7 of 10 (70%). The accused usually chooses whether a military judge alone or a panel of members decides guilt.

Every Recorded Plea Was Contested

Only 10 of the 20 records list the plea. In all 10, the officer contested at least one charge, and none of the recorded pleas was a guilty plea. That is 100% contested, compared with 82% in all Air Force Article 120 cases.

A case is contested when the accused pleads not guilty to at least one charge. Air Force records from 2016 to 2019 rarely list a guilty plea.

Longer Confinement Than the Offense Overall

19 cases ended in a conviction on at least one charge. 15 of those sentences included confinement (79%). The median confinement was 3.3 years, compared with 2.5 years in all Air Force Article 120 cases.

A quarter of the confinement terms were 9 years or longer. These are adjudged sentences, set at trial before any plea-agreement cap, clemency, or appeal, and each covers every charge in the case.

Why This Page Gives No Acquittal Rate

Air Force records rarely list the charges in a case that ends in a full acquittal. Only about one in six do. An acquittal rate for a single offense would therefore undercount acquittals, and this page leaves it out. The 19 convictions should not be read as a conviction rate.

Article 120 Often Stood Alone

Article 120 was the only charge in 11 of the 20 cases. Conduct unbecoming an officer under Article 133 was the most common companion charge, in 5 cases. The general article, Article 134, appeared in 4.

Child sexual abuse (Article 120b), indecent recording and exposure (Article 120c), and perjury (Article 131) each appeared in 1 case.

Where the Cases Were Tried

RAF Lakenheath, United Kingdom, Hurlburt Field, Florida, and Tyndall AFB, Florida, each tried 2 of these cases. Nellis AFB, Nevada, and Andersen AFB, Guam, each tried 1. Together these 5 installations account for 40% of the 20 cases.

Larger installations try more cases of every kind. A higher count at one base does not by itself show anything about that base.

Cases by Year

The yearly counts were 0 in 2016, 2 in 2017, 5 in 2018, 3 in 2019, 1 in 2020, 1 in 2021, 3 in 2022, 2 in 2023, 1 in 2024, and 2 in 2025. All 20 accused were officers, so this group is more senior than the accused in all Air Force Article 120 cases.

Law Changes and Missing Information

Article 120 was rewritten in 2012 and amended again for offenses on or after January 1, 2019, the date the Military Justice Act of 2016 took effect. Each case is charged under the version in force when the offense happened. Article 120 is also a covered offense: since December 28, 2023, special trial counsel rather than commanders decide whether to prosecute it.

The records give trial dates, not offense dates, so they cannot show which version or which rules applied to each case. They also do not show the evidence, the plea terms, or matters handled outside a court-martial.

For what the offense covers and how it is defended, see Article 120 on the law firm's website. Dates and sources for the law changes: UCMJ change timeline.

Compare: federal court. Sexual Abuse of an Adult: Federal Sentences vs. Air Force Courts-Martial, 2016–2025

About the author. Jocelyn C. Stewart is a retired Army JAG with more than 24 years of trying courts-martial and more than 200 jury trials. She hosts Where All The Bodies Are Buried and runs the Law Office of Jocelyn C. Stewart. This analysis is for education and information only. It is not legal advice, and every case is different.