Article 112a With Article 81 in the Army: What the Records Show

Trends › By Offense › Article 112a › Army, with Article 81

Based on 28 cases · 2021–2025 · Army records · data updated October 24, 2026

Terms of 6 Months to 1 Year Were the Largest Group

Sentences of 6 months to 1 year made up 41% of convictions in this pairing. In the rest of the Army, that band was 27% of Article 112a convictions. Terms under 6 months made up 33%, compared with 46%.

At the long end, sentences of more than 1 year came in 5 of 27 convictions (19%). That is about the same as the 17% in Army-wide Article 112a cases. No conviction here brought a term of 5 years or more (0%), compared with 5% in the wider group. Convictions with no confinement made up 7%, compared with 11%.

Median Confinement of 10 Months

Of 27 convictions, 25 carried confinement. The median term was 10 months, longer than the 5 months for the rest of the Army. A quarter of the terms were 1 year or longer.

All of these are adjudged sentences. They are the terms set at trial, before any plea-agreement cap, clemency, or appeal, and each sentence covers every charge in the case.

Guilty Pleas in 24 of 28 Cases

24 accused pleaded guilty and 4 contested at least one charge. A contested case is one with a not-guilty or mixed plea. The contested share was 14%, the same as the 14% in the rest of the Army.

Plea agreements are recorded for 22 of the 24 guilty pleas, and 2 have no entry. Army records say whether there was an agreement, not what it said. The sheet gives no acquittal figures for the 4 contested cases.

Who Decided Guilt

A military judge alone decided 26 cases. An enlisted panel heard 1 and an officer panel heard 1. Members heard 7% of the cases, compared with 8% in Army Article 112a cases overall.

The accused usually chooses between a judge alone and a panel of members. Most judge-alone cases are guilty pleas, so the split mostly follows how many cases were contested.

A Junior Group of Accused

By rank, 22 of the accused were junior enlisted members and 6 were NCOs. No officers appear. The group is more junior than the accused in Army-wide Article 112a cases.

Court level: 20 general and 8 special courts-martial. The general share was 71%, compared with 53% in all Army Article 112a cases. A general court-martial can impose long confinement and a dishonorable discharge. A special court-martial caps confinement at 1 year and cannot impose a dishonorable discharge.

Punitive Discharges

A punitive discharge followed 89% of enlisted convictions. There were 19 bad-conduct discharges and 5 dishonorable discharges. In all Army Article 112a cases in 2021–2025, the rate was 81%.

A punitive discharge is a bad-conduct or dishonorable discharge. A sentence without one does not rule out a later administrative separation, which these records do not cover.

Charges Beyond Drugs and Conspiracy

Every case in this group charged at least one article besides Article 112a. After Article 81, the most common were Article 92 (orders violation) in 8 cases, Article 107 (false official statement) in 6, Article 121 (larceny) in 5, and Article 131b (obstruction) in 4.

Most Cases Came in 2021 and 2022

The cases run from March 2021 to June 2025. There were 9 in 2021 and 12 in 2022. After that, there were 2 in 2023, 2 in 2024, and 3 in 2025.

Fort Bliss had the most cases (6). Fort Bragg and Joint Base Lewis-McChord had 3 each, and Fort Sill and Fort Stewart had 2 each. Together these five installations account for 57% of the 28 cases. Larger installations try more cases of every kind.

What the Records Cannot Show

Since December 28, 2023, special trial counsel, not commanders, decide whether to prosecute covered offenses such as sexual assault, domestic violence, and murder. The services were also required to begin publishing trial records under Article 140a by December 2020, and Army records in this data are sparse before 2021.

This data covers only what reached a courtroom. Cases resolved by nonjudicial punishment, administrative separation, or no action are not included. The records do not describe the evidence or the plea terms. They give trial dates, not offense dates, so they cannot show which cases fell under the sentencing parameters for offenses after December 27, 2023.

For what the offense covers and how it is defended, see Article 112a on the law firm's website. Dates and sources for the law changes: UCMJ change timeline.

Compare: federal court. Drug Use: Federal Sentences vs. Army Courts-Martial · Drug Distribution: Federal Sentences vs. Army Courts-Martial

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.