Camp Pendleton, California, 2017–2018: Charges, Verdicts, and Sentences in 149 Cases
Camp Pendleton, California tried 149 courts-martial in 2017 and 2018, and absence offenses were charged more often than elsewhere. Article 86 (AWOL) was charged in 20% of cases, compared with 7% across the Navy and Marine Corps.
Understanding Trends in Military Practice · 6 min read
Trends › By Installation › Camp Pendleton, California › 2017–2018
Short answer: Camp Pendleton, California tried 149 courts-martial in 2017 and 2018, and absence offenses were charged more often than elsewhere. Article 86 (AWOL) was charged in 20% of cases, compared with 7% across the Navy and Marine Corps. The median confinement was 8 months, about the same as the 7 months service-wide.
AWOL and Orders Charges Were More Common
Charge lists exist for 146 of the 149 cases, and each case is counted once under every article it charged. Article 86 (AWOL) was charged in 29 cases. That 20% share compares with 7% for the Navy and Marine Corps as a whole. Article 92 (orders violation) was also more common: 20% compared with 15%.
Other charges appeared less often than elsewhere. Article 120 (sexual assault) was charged in 10% of cases, compared with 18% service-wide. Article 134 (general article) was charged in 8%, compared with 14%. Article 128 (assault) was the most common charge, in 43 cases (29%), which was lower than the 35% across the service.
| UCMJ Article | Cases | Share here | Share, the Navy and Marine Corps as a whole |
|---|---|---|---|
| Art. 128 Assault | 43 | 29% | 35% |
| Art. 112a Wrongful use, possession of controlled substances | 42 | 29% | 29% |
| Art. 92 Failure to obey order or regulation | 29 | 20% | 15% |
| Art. 86 AWOL | 29 | 20% | 7% |
| Art. 120 Rape and sexual assault | 15 | 10% | 18% |
| Art. 121 Larceny | 13 | 9% | 10% |
| Art. 107 False official statements | 12 | 8% | 11% |
| Art. 134 General article | 11 | 8% | 14% |
Conviction Rates by Charge
All 29 cases charging Article 86 ended in a conviction on that article, and the median confinement for those convictions was 4 months. Article 92 cases ended in a conviction on that article in 27 of 29 cases (93%), with a median of 10 months. Assault cases ended in a conviction in 40 of 43 (93%), with a median of 1 year.
Drug cases had the lowest conviction rate of the most common charges. 37 of 42 cases charging Article 112a ended in a conviction on that article (88%), with a median of 7 months. One case can include a conviction on one article and an acquittal on another, so these rows overlap.
| Article | Cases charging it | Convicted of it (share) | Median confinement when convicted of it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Art. 128 Assault | 43 | 40 (93%) | 1 year |
| Art. 112a Wrongful use, possession of controlled substances | 42 | 37 (88%) | 7 months |
| Art. 92 Failure to obey order or regulation | 29 | 27 (93%) | 10 months |
| Art. 86 AWOL | 29 | 29 (100%) | 4 months |
How Much Confinement?
Of 138 convictions, 123 included confinement. The median confinement was 8 months, and a quarter of the sentences were 2 years or longer. One sentence was life.
The confinement ranges were about the same as service-wide. Terms longer than one year were part of 44 of 138 convictions (32%), compared with 30% across all Navy and Marine Corps cases. 11% of convictions included no confinement, compared with 12%. These are adjudged sentences, before any plea-agreement limit, clemency, or appeal, and each covers every charge in the case.
| Adjudged confinement | Convictions | Share here | Share, the Navy and Marine Corps as a whole |
|---|---|---|---|
| No confinement | 15 | 11% | 12% |
| Under 6 months | 49 | 36% | 34% |
| 6 months to 1 year | 30 | 22% | 23% |
| More than 1 year, under 5 years | 30 | 22% | 20% |
| 5 years or more | 14 | 10% | 10% |
Most Punitive Discharges Were Bad-Conduct Discharges
Of 136 convicted enlisted members, 96 received a punitive discharge: 72 bad-conduct discharges and 24 dishonorable discharges. That rate of 71% was higher than the 67% across all Navy and Marine Corps cases in those years.
The 1 convicted officer or warrant officer in the group was dismissed. Dismissal is the officer equivalent of a punitive discharge. When no punitive discharge was adjudged, an administrative separation could still follow, and these records do not show it.
Most Cases Were Special Courts-Martial
Only 52 of the 149 cases were general courts-martial, a 35% share compared with 45% across the Navy and Marine Corps. The other 97 were special courts-martial. A special court-martial caps confinement at one year and cannot impose a dishonorable discharge.
Sentences differed by court level. General courts-martial had a median confinement of 3 years. Special courts-martial had a median of 4 months. Only a general court-martial can adjudge more than one year of confinement.
Most of the Accused Were Junior Enlisted
The accused included 115 junior enlisted members (E-1 to E-4), 21 NCOs (E-5 to E-9), and 1 officer or warrant officer. In the rest of the Navy and Marine Corps, 64% of the accused were junior enlisted, so this group was more junior.
Compared With Camp Lejeune and Norfolk
Camp Lejeune, North Carolina tried 140 cases in the same years, and Norfolk, Virginia tried 94. Camp Lejeune had the same median confinement as Camp Pendleton, 8 months. Norfolk's median was 9 months.
Punitive discharge rates differed more. The rate was 82% at Camp Lejeune, 71% at Camp Pendleton, and 53% at Norfolk. Navy and Marine Corps records before December 2020 often omit the plea. The table shows plea results for very few Camp Pendleton or Camp Lejeune cases, so contested shares and acquittal rates are not compared here.
| Installation | Cases | Contested | Full acquittals (decided contested) | Median confinement | Punitive discharge (enlisted) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Camp Pendleton, California | 149 | 0 of 1 | — | 8 months | 71% |
| Camp Lejeune, North Carolina | 140 | 0 of 4 | — | 8 months | 82% |
| Norfolk, Virginia | 94 | 30% | 12 of 28 | 9 months | 53% |
When the Cases Were Tried
The data includes 71 cases in 2017 and 78 in 2018. Together they are 15% of the 1,002 Navy and Marine Corps courts-martial in those years.
All of these trials took place before the Military Justice Act of 2016 took effect on January 1, 2019. That law set fixed panel sizes, created judge-alone special courts-martial capped at six months with no punitive discharge, and introduced written plea agreements. Cases with offenses from before 2019 stayed under the old rules.
What the Records Do Not Show
The records give trial dates but not offense dates. They also do not include the evidence, the plea terms, or any case handled by nonjudicial punishment or administrative separation.
Dates and sources for the law changes mentioned here: UCMJ change timeline.
How We Counted
Every court-martial in the data tried at Camp Pendleton, California with a trial date in 2017–2018 (149 cases), compared with all 1,002 Navy and Marine Corps trials in those years. Dates are trial dates.
Source: public court-martial records (Article 140a, UCMJ) in Military Trial Results, data updated October 24, 2026. Definitions, sources, and known gaps: how this data was built. Errors: content@bodiesburied.com.
Related Analysis
- Camp Pendleton, California: Court-Martial Data and Trends (hub)
- Navy-Marine Corps Courts-Martial: Data and Trends (hub)
- By Installation (hub)
- What Was Tried at Camp Pendleton, California, 2019–2023? 291 Courts-Martial (another period)
- Inside 142 Courts-Martial at Camp Pendleton, California, 2024–2026 (another period)
- Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, 2017–2018: Charges, Verdicts, and Sentences in 140 Cases (same years, similar size)
- Inside 70 Courts-Martial at Okinawa, Japan, 2017–2018 (same years, similar size)
- Article 128 at Camp Pendleton, California Before and After 2019
- Article 112a at Camp Pendleton, California Before and After 2019
- S1 E33: Dismissing the Camp Pendleton Case (podcast, members)
- Search every case in Military Trial Results (members)
Military Judges Who Presided Over Cases at Camp Pendleton, California, 2017–2018
Names and links only. Each judge's record of pleas, findings, and sentences is on their Know Your Judge page, part of the Court-Martial Characters membership.
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.