Did Orders Violation Cases at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina Change After 2019?

Trends › By Installation › Camp Lejeune, North Carolina › Article 92

Based on 79 cases · 2019–2023 · Navy and Marine Corps records · data updated October 24, 2026

No Full Acquittals in Contested Cases

A case is contested when the accused pleads not guilty to at least one charge. 21 contested Article 92 cases at Camp Lejeune reached a verdict. 0 ended in a full acquittal. 6 (29%) ended in a partial acquittal, meaning not guilty of at least one charge or specification but guilty of another.

In Navy and Marine Corps Article 92 cases overall, 11% of contested cases that reached a verdict ended in a full acquittal. The records do not describe the evidence, so they cannot show why the results here were different.

Contested Cases Were More Common

51 records list a plea. Of those, 30 show a guilty plea and 21 show a not-guilty or mixed plea. The contested share was 41%, compared with 35% in the Navy and Marine Corps as a whole. Many records have no plea, because Navy and Marine Corps records before December 2020 often omit it. The records also do not show why an accused pleaded guilty or the terms of any agreement.

Punitive Discharges Were More Common

A punitive discharge is a bad-conduct or dishonorable discharge for enlisted members. For officers, the equivalent is a dismissal. Among 72 convicted enlisted members, 52 received a bad-conduct or dishonorable discharge (72%). In Navy and Marine Corps-wide Article 92 cases, the share was 58%. Of the 52 discharges, 5 were dishonorable.

The 1 convicted officer or warrant officer was not dismissed. A sentence without a punitive discharge can still be followed by an administrative separation. These records do not include administrative separations.

How Much Confinement?

Of 77 convictions, 61 carried confinement. The median confinement was 7 months, longer than the 6 months in all Navy and Marine Corps Article 92 cases. A quarter of the terms were 1 year or more.

Terms longer than one year came in 12 of 77 convictions (16%), the same share as service-wide. The difference was in the middle range. Terms of 6 months to 1 year made up 31% here, compared with 22%. Terms under 6 months made up 32%, compared with 38%. No conviction carried 5 years or more. 16 convictions carried no confinement (21%, compared with 24%). These are adjudged sentences, before any plea-agreement cap, clemency, or appeal. Each covers every charge in the case.

Other Charges in the Same Cases

In 70 of the 79 cases, at least one other article was charged. Article 112a (drug) was the most common, in 28 cases. Article 128 (assault) appeared in 24, Article 121 (larceny) in 14, Article 107 (false official statement) in 13, and Article 131b (obstruction) in 12.

The sentence covers the whole case, not the orders violation alone.

Changes Since 2017–2018

The 2017–2018 records have 22 Article 92 cases over 2 years. In the later period, the yearly counts were 17 in 2019, 12 in 2020, 34 in 2021, 10 in 2022, and 6 in 2023. 2021 had the most cases. These cases were 28% of the 283 courts-martial at Camp Lejeune in 2019–2023.

The median confinement was 6 months in 2017–2018 and 7 months in 2019–2023. Convictions with confinement were 95% in the earlier period and 79% in the later one. Punitive discharges for convicted enlisted members were 81% and then 72%. General courts-martial were 32% of cases and then 30%. Too few earlier records list a plea to compare. These groups are small, and a few cases can change the figures. The changes show a direction only.

Court Level and Rank

General courts-martial, which can impose long confinement and a dishonorable discharge, tried 24 cases (30%). At that level, 88% of convictions carried confinement, with a median of 1.1 years. Special courts-martial are capped at one year and cannot impose a dishonorable discharge. At the 55 special courts-martial, 75% of convictions carried confinement, with a median of 4 months.

The accused were 55 junior enlisted members (E-1 to E-4), 17 NCOs, and 1 officer. That group is more junior than in the rest of the Navy and Marine Corps. With only 1 officer, no officer figure on this page means much.

What the Records Do Not Show

Orders violations handled through nonjudicial punishment, administrative separation, or no action are not in these records. The records also do not include the evidence, the plea terms, or the offense dates.

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.