Fort Bragg Courts-Martial, 2020–2023: What 143 Cases Show

Trends › By Installation › Fort Bragg › 2020–2023

Based on 143 cases · 2020–2023 · Army records · data updated October 24, 2026

Fewer Full Acquittals, More Partial Acquittals

Of the 50 contested cases that reached a verdict, 11 ended in a full acquittal. That 22% full-acquittal rate is lower than the 37% seen across the Army in the same years.

Partial acquittals were more common: 24 contested cases ended in a partial acquittal, meaning a not-guilty finding on at least one charge or specification alongside a guilty finding on another. Army results list findings charge by charge, so these mixed results are visible in the records.

Panels and Judges Reached Different Results

Contested cases decided by members ended in a full acquittal 24% of the time (7 of 29). Contested cases decided by a military judge alone ended in a full acquittal 15% of the time (3 of 20). At this installation, members acquitted more often than judges.

Across all cases, 110 were tried by judge alone, 26 by enlisted panels, and 6 by officer panels. Members heard 23% of cases, compared with 21% in the rest of the Army, and 32 of 56 contested cases (57%). The accused usually chooses the forum, and because most judge-alone cases are guilty pleas, the split largely follows how many cases were contested.

Which Charges Appeared Most Often?

Charges are listed in 129 of the 143 records, and each article counts once per case. Article 128 (assault) was the most common charge, in 33% of cases, close to the Army's 31%. Article 120 (rape and sexual assault) and Article 134 each appeared in 29% of cases.

Some articles were charged more often than Army-wide: Article 134 in 29% of cases compared with 22%, and Article 128b (domestic violence) in 19% compared with 13%. Article 92, Article 120b, and Article 90 were also somewhat more common here than across the service.

Conviction Rates Differed by Article

Among the top charges, Article 92 most often ended in a conviction on that article (24 of 27), followed by Article 134 at 87%. Article 120 ended in a conviction on that article least often, 23 of 38 (61%).

When there was a conviction, the median confinement tied to each article varied widely: 3 months for Article 92, 5 months for Article 128, 7 months for Article 134, and 2.1 years for Article 120. A case can produce a conviction on one article and an acquittal on another, so the rows overlap.

Guilty Pleas and Plea Agreements

The plea is listed in 141 of 143 records: 84 guilty pleas and 57 not-guilty or mixed pleas. A case counts as contested when the accused pleads not guilty to at least one charge, and the contested share here, 40%, is higher than the 35% Army-wide.

Of the 84 guilty pleas, 69 are recorded with a plea agreement and 15 have no entry. Army records note whether an agreement existed, not its terms. Pleas also varied by charge: cases charging Article 92 ended in a guilty plea 63% of the time (17 of 27), while cases charging Article 120 did so 24% of the time (9 of 38). The records do not say why an accused pleaded guilty or contested the charges.

Confinement About the Same as the Army

Of the 143 cases, 118 ended in a conviction on at least one charge, and 96 of those sentences included confinement (81%). The median was 6 months, the same as the Army-wide median, and a quarter of the sentences were 1.5 years or longer. These are adjudged sentences, before any plea-agreement cap, clemency, or appeal, and each covers every charge in the case.

Sentences longer than one year were imposed in 30 of 118 convictions (25%), about the same as the 27% across the Army. The median confinement was 7 months at general courts-martial and 3 months at special courts-martial. Only a general court-martial can adjudge more than one year of confinement.

Discharges and Dismissals

Of 107 convicted enlisted members, 83 received a punitive discharge: 57 bad-conduct discharges and 26 dishonorable discharges. The share across the Army was 73%. Among 11 convicted officers or warrant officers, 8 were dismissed, the officer equivalent.

A sentence with no punitive discharge does not rule out a later administrative separation, which falls outside these records.

Who Was Tried, and at What Level?

By rank, the accused included 82 junior enlisted members, 49 NCOs, and 12 officers, a mix similar to the Army as a whole. General courts-martial made up 119 cases and special courts-martial 24, a general share of 83% compared with 75% Army-wide.

The court level sets the maximum sentence. A general court-martial can impose any lawful sentence, including a dishonorable discharge, while a special court-martial caps confinement at one year and cannot impose a dishonorable discharge.

Fort Bragg Beside Fort Hood and Lewis-McChord

Fort Hood (147 cases) and Joint Base Lewis-McChord (139) tried similar numbers in the same years. Fort Hood had a higher contested share at 46%, Lewis-McChord a lower one at 30%, and Fort Bragg was between them at 40%. Full acquittals were 22 of 65 contested cases that reached a verdict at Fort Hood and 17 of 41 at Lewis-McChord.

Median confinement was 6 months here and at Lewis-McChord, and 8 months at Fort Hood. The enlisted punitive discharge share was 78% here, 82% at Fort Hood, and 74% at Lewis-McChord.

Timing, Names, and Gaps in the Data

The cases run from June 2020 to December 2023, with yearly counts of 14, 45, 51, and 33, or 9% of the 1,581 Army courts-martial in those years. Army records in this data are sparse before 2021, so 2020 is thin. The post was named Fort Liberty from 2023 until February 2025, but the records list these trials under Fort Bragg throughout.

The records give trial dates rather than offense dates. They do not describe the evidence or plea terms, and they leave out nonjudicial punishment and administrative separations.

Dates and sources for the law changes mentioned here: 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.