Orders Violation Charges at Bremerton, Washington, 2013–2018: Pleas, Verdicts, and Sentences

Trends › By Installation › Bremerton, Washington › Article 92, 2013–2018

Based on 21 cases · 2013–2018 · Navy and Marine Corps records · data updated October 24, 2026

Orders Violations Tried Mostly at the Lower Court Level

This post covers a single offense at a single installation: Article 92 cases at Bremerton, Washington, from 2013 through 2018. The main difference in this group is court level. Only 4 of the 21 cases were general courts-martial (19%). Special courts-martial made up the rest.

Court level sets the maximum sentence. A special court-martial caps confinement at one year and can impose a bad-conduct discharge but not a dishonorable discharge. A general court-martial can impose any lawful sentence. The records cannot show how much the court level, rather than the facts of each case, affected the sentences.

How Long Were the Sentences?

All 21 cases ended in a conviction, and 20 sentences included confinement. The median confinement was 4 months, about the same as the 5 months for Navy and Marine Corps Article 92 cases as a whole. A quarter of the sentences here were 8 months or longer.

Sentences under 6 months made up 67% of convictions at Bremerton, compared with 42% across the service. Sentences longer than one year were less common: 2 of 21 (10%), compared with 17%. No sentence here was 5 years or more. These figures are adjudged sentences, before any plea-agreement cap, clemency, or appeal. Each sentence covers every charge in the case.

Convictions with no confinement were less common here. Only 5% of convictions had no confinement, compared with 19% across Navy and Marine Corps Article 92 cases. Sentences of 6 months to 1 year made up 19% here, compared with 22% across the service. Sentences of more than 1 year but under 5 years made up 10%, compared with 11%.

Drug Charges Often Came Along

Article 92 was the only charge in 3 of the 21 cases. Across Navy and Marine Corps Article 92 cases overall, 53 of 291 charged it by itself. The most common companion charge at Bremerton was Article 112a (drug offenses), in 10 cases.

Other common companion charges were Article 81 (conspiracy) in 6 cases, Article 131b (obstruction, numbered since 2019) in 5, Article 107 (false official statement) in 3, and Article 121 (larceny) in 3. An orders violation charge can cover anything from breaking a lawful general regulation to failing to follow a specific order. The companion charges often say more about the case than the Article 92 count does.

Nearly Every Recorded Plea Was Guilty

Of the 21 records, 19 list a plea. In 18 cases the accused pleaded guilty, and 1 case was contested. A contested case is one with a not-guilty or mixed plea. The contested share was 5%, compared with 23% across all Navy and Marine Corps Article 92 cases in 2013–2018. Cases here went to trial on the merits less often.

Navy and Marine Corps records before December 2020 often omit the plea. These counts use only the records that list a plea. A guilty plea usually ends a case without a trial on the merits, so the contested share is a rough measure of how many cases went to trial.

Bad-Conduct Discharges Only

The records show 0 dishonorable discharges in this group. All 10 punitive discharges were bad-conduct discharges. They followed 50% of enlisted convictions, compared with 60% in Navy and Marine Corps Article 92 cases.

The records show 1 convicted officer or warrant officer, and that officer was not dismissed. A sentence without a punitive discharge does not rule out a later administrative separation.

Rank of the Accused

Junior enlisted members, E-1 to E-4, made up 62% of the accused at Bremerton. NCOs made up 33%, and officers made up 5%. Across Navy and Marine Corps Article 92 cases, junior enlisted members were 51% of the accused. This group was more junior.

Cases by Year

The trials took place from February 2013 to November 2018. The yearly counts were 1 in 2013, 2 in 2014, 5 in 2015, 3 in 2016, 5 in 2017, and 5 in 2018.

The 21 cases represent 10% of the 221 courts-martial tried at Bremerton in those years. All of them were tried before the Military Justice Act of 2016 took effect on January 1, 2019. That law created judge-alone special courts-martial capped at six months and introduced written plea agreements.

What Lies Outside These Records

Only cases that reached a courtroom appear here. Nonjudicial punishment, administrative separations, and cases closed without action are not counted. The records also do not describe the evidence, the plea terms, or the dates of the offenses themselves. With only 21 cases, a few outcomes can change any percentage here. The comparisons with service-wide figures describe these cases. They do not predict future cases.

For what the offense covers and how it is defended, see Article 92 on the law firm's website. Dates and sources for the law changes: UCMJ change timeline.

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.