A Year of Courts-Martial at Camp Pendleton, California: 2025
Camp Pendleton, California held 55 courts-martial in 2025. Of the contested cases that reached a verdict, 2 of 19 ended in a full acquittal (11%), compared with 27% across the Navy and Marine Corps.
Understanding Trends in Military Practice · 7 min read
Trends › By Installation › Camp Pendleton, California › 2025
Short answer: Camp Pendleton, California held 55 courts-martial in 2025. Of the contested cases that reached a verdict, 2 of 19 ended in a full acquittal (11%), compared with 27% across the Navy and Marine Corps. Drunken or reckless driving under Article 113 was charged in 11% of cases, compared with 4% service-wide, and 88% of convictions included confinement.
Few Full Acquittals
A case is contested when the accused pleads not guilty to at least one charge, either as a full not-guilty plea or as a mixed plea. At Camp Pendleton in 2025, 19 contested cases reached a verdict. Only 2 ended in a full acquittal (11%).
Across all Navy and Marine Corps cases that year, 27% of contested cases that reached a verdict ended in a full acquittal. Another 3 cases here ended in a partial acquittal. In a partial acquittal, the accused is found not guilty of at least one charge or specification and guilty of another.
More Contested Cases Than in 2024
The number of cases rose slightly, from 50 in 2024 to 55 in 2025. The larger change was in pleas. The contested share of cases with a recorded plea went from 24% in 2024 to 37% in 2025.
Full acquittals did not increase. 3 of 11 contested cases that reached a verdict ended in a full acquittal in 2024, and 2 of 19 in 2025. The general court-martial share was about the same: 32% and 31%. In groups this small a few cases can change these figures, so they show direction, not a precise trend.
| 2024 | 2025 | |
|---|---|---|
| Cases | 50 | 55 |
| Contested (of pleas recorded) | 24% | 37% |
| Full acquittals (decided contested) | 3 of 11 | 2 of 19 |
| Convictions with confinement | 80% | 88% |
| Median confinement | 4 months | 4 months |
| Punitive discharge (enlisted) | 68% | 53% |
| General courts-martial | 32% | 31% |
Driving, Assault, and Orders Charges
All 55 records list the charges, and each article is counted once per case. Failure to obey an order or regulation under Article 92 was the most common charge, at 24%, the same share as in the rest of the Navy and Marine Corps.
Assault under Article 128 was charged in 22% of cases, compared with 16% elsewhere. Domestic violence under Article 128b was charged in 15%, compared with 11%. Article 113 (drunken or reckless driving) had the largest difference from the rest of the service: 11% compared with 4%. Article 134, the general article, was charged less often: 13% compared with 21%.
| UCMJ Article | Cases | Share here | Share, the rest of the Navy and Marine Corps |
|---|---|---|---|
| Art. 92 Failure to obey order or regulation | 13 | 24% | 24% |
| Art. 128 Assault | 12 | 22% | 16% |
| Art. 128b Domestic violence | 8 | 15% | 11% |
| Art. 134 General article | 7 | 13% | 21% |
| Art. 113 Drunken or reckless operation of vehicle | 6 | 11% | 4% |
| Art. 90 Willfully disobeying superior officer | 5 | 9% | 5% |
| Art. 112a Wrongful use, possession of controlled substances | 4 | 7% | 10% |
| Art. 86 AWOL | 3 | 5% | 4% |
Conviction Rates by Article
All 13 cases charging Article 92 ended in a conviction on that article, with a median confinement of 2 months. Article 128 had the lowest rate of the most common charges, 10 of 12 (83%), with a median of 6 months. 7 of 8 domestic violence cases ended in a conviction on that article, with a median of 8 months.
Guilty plea rates also differed by charge. 64% of cases charging Article 128 ended in a guilty plea (7 of 11), the highest of the most common charges. 50% of cases charging Article 92 ended in a guilty plea (6 of 12). The records do not say why an accused pleaded guilty or went to trial.
| Article | Cases charging it | Convicted of it (share) | Median confinement when convicted of it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Art. 92 Failure to obey order or regulation | 13 | 13 (100%) | 2 months |
| Art. 128 Assault | 12 | 10 (83%) | 6 months |
| Art. 128b Domestic violence | 8 | 7 (7 of 8) | 8 months |
Most Convictions Included Confinement
52 cases ended in a conviction on at least one charge, and 46 of those sentences included confinement (88%). Only 12% of convictions here included no confinement, compared with 31% across the Navy and Marine Corps.
The median confinement was 4 months, the same as the service-wide median. A quarter of sentences were 9 months or longer. Most terms were short: 52% were under 6 months, compared with 37% elsewhere. Terms longer than one year were part of 7 of 52 convictions (13%), compared with 16% service-wide. These are adjudged sentences, set at trial before any plea-agreement limit, clemency, or appeal, and each covers every charge in the case.
| Adjudged confinement | Convictions | Share here | Share, Navy and Marine Corps-wide |
|---|---|---|---|
| No confinement | 6 | 12% | 31% |
| Under 6 months | 27 | 52% | 37% |
| 6 months to 1 year | 12 | 23% | 16% |
| More than 1 year, under 5 years | 6 | 12% | 11% |
| 5 years or more | 1 | 2% | 5% |
General and Special Courts-Martial
A general court-martial can impose any lawful sentence, including long confinement and a dishonorable discharge. A special court-martial caps confinement at one year and cannot impose a dishonorable discharge. Of the 55 cases, 17 were general courts-martial (31%), compared with 36% across all Navy and Marine Corps cases.
Sentences differed by court level. Every conviction in a general court-martial included confinement, with a median of 1 year. In the 38 special courts-martial, 84% of convictions included confinement, with a median of 2 months.
Punitive Discharges
For an enlisted member, a punitive discharge is a bad-conduct discharge or a dishonorable discharge. Of 49 convicted enlisted members, 26 received one: 20 bad-conduct discharges and 6 dishonorable discharges. That rate of 53% was higher than the 46% service-wide. It was lower than the 68% at this base in 2024.
The 2025 records include 1 convicted officer or warrant officer, who was dismissed. Dismissal is the officer equivalent of a punitive discharge. A sentence without a punitive discharge does not rule out a later administrative separation.
Most of the Accused Were Junior Enlisted
Junior enlisted members in grades E-1 to E-4 made up 79% of the accused. NCOs made up 17%, and officers made up 4%. Across all Navy and Marine Corps cases in 2025, junior enlisted members made up 62%.
Compared With San Diego and Camp Lejeune
San Diego, California and Camp Lejeune, North Carolina tried a similar number of cases in 2025. Both had lower contested shares, 26% and 29%, compared with 37% at Camp Pendleton. San Diego had 1 full acquittal in 10 contested cases that reached a verdict. Camp Lejeune had 2 of 10.
The median confinement was 3 months at San Diego and 4 months at Camp Lejeune. Punitive discharges for enlisted members were less common at both: 29% and 45%.
| Installation | Cases | Contested | Full acquittals (decided contested) | Median confinement | Punitive discharge (enlisted) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Camp Pendleton, California | 55 | 37% | 2 of 19 | 4 months | 53% |
| San Diego, California | 38 | 26% | 1 of 10 | 3 months | 29% |
| Camp Lejeune, North Carolina | 37 | 29% | 2 of 10 | 4 months | 45% |
Rule Changes and What the Records Leave Out
Since December 28, 2023, special trial counsel, not commanders, decide whether to prosecute covered offenses such as sexual assault, domestic violence, and murder. When every guilty finding in a case is for an offense after December 27, 2023, the military judge sets the sentence under new sentencing parameters. Both rules depend on when the offense happened. These records list only trial dates, so 2025 trials include cases under both the old and new rules.
The records show charges, pleas, findings, and sentences. They do not describe the evidence or the terms of plea agreements. They do not include misconduct handled through nonjudicial punishment or administrative separation.
Dates and sources for the law changes mentioned here: UCMJ change timeline.
How We Counted
Every court-martial tried at Camp Pendleton, California with a trial date in 2025 (55 cases).
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)
- By Year (hub)
- A Year of Courts-Martial at Camp Pendleton, California: 2024 (previous / next)
- Inside 142 Courts-Martial at Camp Pendleton, California, 2024–2026 (the whole period)
- A Year of Courts-Martial at Bremerton, Washington: 2015
- A Year of Courts-Martial at Bremerton, Washington: 2017
- A Year of Courts-Martial at Bremerton, Washington: 2018
- A Year of Courts-Martial at Bremerton, Washington: 2020
- A Year of Courts-Martial at Bremerton, Washington: 2021
- 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, 2025
- Alexander Douvas
- Todd Gaston
- Andrea Goode
- Matthew Harris
- Douglas Hatch
- Andrea Lockhart
- Peter Mcneilly
- Derek Poteet
- David Segraves
- Aran Walsh
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.