Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson Courts-Martial, 2020–2023: What 32 Cases Show

Trends › By Installation › Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson › 2020–2023

Based on 32 cases · 2020–2023 · Army records · data updated October 24, 2026

Larceny Was Charged More Often Than Across the Army

Of the 29 cases whose records list charges, 6 charged Article 121 (larceny), or 21%. Across the Army the share was 7%. Article 134 (general article) was charged in 9 cases (31%), compared with 22%.

Article 128 (assault) was the most common charge, in 10 cases (34%), about the same as the Army's 31%. Article 120 (rape and sexual assault) was less common: 4 cases (14%), compared with 25% across the Army. A single case can count under several articles, so these shares overlap.

Every Guilty Plea Had a Plea Agreement

Of the 32 cases, 24 ended in a guilty plea and 8 were contested, meaning the accused pleaded not guilty to at least one charge. The contested share was 25%, lower than the 35% in the rest of the Army.

Every one of the 24 guilty pleas is recorded with a plea agreement. Army records say whether an agreement existed, not what it said, so the terms and any sentence limits are not visible here. Of the contested cases that reached a verdict, 2 of 6 ended in a full acquittal.

The Most Common Charges Ended in Conviction

Every case charging one of the 2 most common articles ended in a conviction on that article. All 10 cases charging Article 128 did, and the median confinement was 3 months. All 9 cases charging Article 134 did, and the median confinement was 6 months.

Because one case can produce a conviction on one article and an acquittal on another, these rows overlap and do not add up to the case total.

Shorter Sentences Than Across the Army

Confinement was part of 82% of the 28 convictions. The median confinement was 5 months, compared with 6 months in the rest of the Army. A quarter of the sentences were 1 year or longer. These are adjudged sentences, before any plea-agreement cap, clemency, or appeal, and each covers every charge in the case.

5 of 28 convictions (18%) included more than one year of confinement, compared with 27% across the Army. No conviction here included 5 years or more, compared with 8% in the rest of the Army. The most common sentence length was under 6 months, in 43% of convictions.

Fewer General Courts-Martial

General courts-martial made up 62% of the 29 cases with a court level listed (18 of 29), compared with 75% in the Army as a whole. A general court-martial can impose any lawful sentence, including long confinement and a dishonorable discharge or dismissal; a special court-martial caps confinement at one year and cannot impose a dishonorable discharge.

The median confinement was 9 months at general courts-martial and 2 months at special courts-martial. The contested share was 22% at the general level and 27% at the special level.

How Many Received a Punitive Discharge?

A punitive discharge is a bad-conduct or dishonorable discharge for enlisted members, or dismissal for officers. Of 26 convicted enlisted members, 17 received one: 14 bad-conduct and 3 dishonorable. That share, 65%, compares with 73% in all Army cases in those years.

The records list 2 convicted officers or warrant officers, and none was dismissed. A sentence without a punitive discharge does not rule out a later administrative separation.

Judges, Panels, and Rank

The accused usually chooses whether a military judge alone or a panel of members decides guilt. A judge alone decided 26 of 31 cases with the forum listed (84%), and members heard 5: 3 enlisted panels and 2 officer panels. Most judge-alone cases are guilty pleas.

The accused were 18 junior enlisted members (E-1 to E-4), 11 NCOs (E-5 to E-9), and 3 officers or warrant officers. That mix is similar to the rest of the Army, where 57% were junior enlisted.

Compared With Similar Army Installations

Fort Leonard Wood (27 cases) and Fort Sill (37 cases) tried a similar number of Army cases in the same years. Both had a median confinement of 6 months, compared with 5 months here. Their enlisted punitive discharge shares were 83% and 77%, both higher than the 65% at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson.

Dates, Coverage, and Gaps

The yearly counts were 2 in 2020, 8 in 2021, 13 in 2022, and 9 in 2023, which is 2% of the 1,581 Army courts-martial in those years. The services were required to begin publishing trial records under Article 140a by December 2020. Army records in this data are sparse before 2021, so 2020 has few cases.

Trial records show charges, pleas, findings, and sentences. They do not show offense dates, the evidence, the plea terms, or conduct handled outside a court-martial, such as nonjudicial punishment or administrative separation.

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.