Posted on 04/16/2015 1:38:44 AM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
n addition to desertion, Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl faces an unusual charge: misbehavior before the enemy. Of the two, it is the far more serious charge, carrying with it a maximum punishment of life behind bars, a dishonorable discharge, a reduction in rank, and the loss of the tens of thousands of dollars of pay and benefits Bergdahl earned after joining the military over six years ago.
The misbehavior charge is so rare that there arent many examples of how the military justice system has handled it in the past. The Army said that it had such a case in 2005, but wouldnt provide any details without a Freedom of Information Act request. The Marine Corps last leveled the charge against one of its own in 2004 when it went after a lance corporal who had refused to go on convoy duty in Iraq.
The latter case the United States vs. Thomas H. King shows how seriously the military takes these offenses and offers the most recent illustration available of what the military means when it accuses a member of the armed forces of committing the little-known crime.
Its not apples to apples, but the takeaway from the King case is that the military seriously frowns upon this kind of behavior, said Zachary Spilman, a civilian defense attorney and lead author of the military justice blog CAAFlog. If Bergdahls case goes to trial, and he gets convicted, the sentence could be significant.
According to the Uniform Code of Military Justice, Article 99, or misbehavior before the enemy, covers a wide range of misconduct, from running away to leaving ones post to plunder or pillage to leaving behind your weapons....
(Excerpt) Read more at foreignpolicy.com ...
There is just no way Obama will allow any conviction of Berghdal. He is completely invested in the muslim traitor and the “optics” are the most important thing to Obama. I would hate to be the prosecutor in this case.
There is just no way Obama will allow any conviction of Berghdal. He is completely invested in the muslim traitor and the “optics” are the most important thing to Obama. I would hate to be the prosecutor in this case.
He actually should have been charged with treason and defecting to the enemy. But I suspect that the Army knew there was no way Obama would let that happen, so they got as close to it as they could with this charge.
If Bergdahl would just say he was nuts, and was nuts prior to the Coast Guard boot-camp, nuts when they discharged him from the Coast Guard, and nuts when the Army signed him up....he might have a slightly better case. As it stands now...with a combat-experience jury...I don’t see him getting off either episode and he’s liable to spend a minimum of ten years in prison (maybe even life).
When he is finally let go....I’m betting he packs up a bag and leaves the US within six months.
I predict a plea deal that involves no confinement.
The rest of it:
“... And, as the King case shows, you dont even
have to leave your base to be found guilty of it.
In early 2004, King, a Marine lance corporal,
deployed to Iraq as part of a Marine Corps
security battalion tasked with protecting
convoys delivering supplies and ammunition to
other units.
In March, he refused to provide security for a
convoy about to leave Al Asad Air Base in
Anbar province, according to documents from
his case. Afraid of getting killed in combat, King
refused to accept ammunition for his rifle,
refused to carry a loaded weapon as a
member of the convoy, and refused the option
of not carrying a rifle but serving as a driver
for the convoy.
Following this standoff, King was sent to a staff
psychiatrist for evaluation. He was deemed
mentally fit and returned to his unit. But the
next day, he disobeyed orders again, and was
found to be disrespectful toward officers
more senior than him, according to court
records.
The staff psychiatrist monitored him closely
over the next several days, and concluded that
while he had experienced an operational
stress reaction, King was competent to face
the legal consequences of his actions.
One month later, in April 2004, King was
charged with misbehavior before the enemy
and an array of other offenses. He pleaded
guilty to all of them.
But several months after his conviction, King
appealed, arguing that his guilty pleas were
invalid because he was mentally incompetent
at the time. A year had passed since the case,
and Kings legal counsel noted that the Marine
had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder by a
psychiatrist with the Veterans Affairs
Department.
In a 2005 appeal, Kings lawyer also said his
clients guilty pleas didnt hold up because it
was never proved that his actions took place
before the enemy.
But a panel of judges disagreed and in 2006,
Kings conviction was upheld. He was
sentenced to confinement for one year, had
his rank reduced, had to forfeit his pay, and
was given a bad-conduct discharge.
The judges found that even though Kings
refusals to go on duty occurred while still
inside the base, his actions still took place
before the enemy, because enemy forces
operated in the immediate area around the
base.
In its appeal decision, the panel also said King
displayed cowardice at a time when his unit
was about to embark on a tactical operation in
an area teeming with both organized and
unorganized forces of the Iraqi insurgency.
In other words, the fact that he was still on
base didnt matter.
Unlike King, Bergdahl was stationed at a
remote outpost in Paktika province, not on a
sprawling U.S. military base. And he willingly
walked off it, something King never did. Still,
the military believes both men basically
committed the same crime.
In its summary of his charges, the Army says
that on June 30, 2009, Bergdahl endangered
the safety of Observation Post Mest, a remote
Army base in eastern Afghanistan, and Task
Force Yukon, by walking off the post alone and
without authority, wrongfully causing search
and recovery operations. He did all of this
before the enemy, according to the charge
sheet.
But this charge has nothing to do with what
Bergdahl did during his five years as a prisoner
of the Taliban.
There is no evidence of misbehavior of any
kind while he was held captive, Bergdahls
lawyer, Eugene Fidell, wrote in a March 2 letter
to Gen. Mark Milley, who was tasked with the
decision whether to charge Bergdahl. A copy
of the letter was shared with Foreign Policy.
The letter states that Bergdahls first attempt
at escaping his Taliban captors occurred within
a few hours of being taken prisoner. During his
time in captivity, according to Bergdahl, he
was beaten, tortured and held in a cage.
In his letter, Fidell argues that Bergdahls
nearly five years of harsh captivity should be
taken into account. He says it would be
unduly harsh to impose on him the lifetime
stigma of a court-martial conviction.
Photo by U.S. Army via Getty Images “
Abandoning post and running from the enemy is desertion, abandoning post and running to the enemy is what traitors do. Bergdahl is a traitor. Men died searching for the traitor. Top enemy commanders - terrorists - where traded, against military recommendation for their continued imprisonment and warning that these terrorists continue to pose a high risk to the U.S., for Bergdahl’s release. The Obama administration continuously interferes with the prosecution of Bergdahl.
It is beyond a reasonable doubt that Obama’s allegiance lies with the enemy. The Bergdahl incident is only one of many instances of Obama giving aid and comfort to the enemy.
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