Friday, January 4, 2019

Massachusetts has a new military justice code

Gov. Charlie Baker of Massachusetts has signed into law a bill that includes the Massachusetts Code of Military Justice. Mass. Acts of 2018 ch. 369. Article 2(b) prescribes the subject matter jurisdiction of the Commonwealth's title 32 courts-martial:
Subject matter jurisdiction shall be established if a nexus exists between an offense, either military or non-military, and the state military force. Courts-martial have primary jurisdiction of military offenses as defined in article 1. A civilian court has primary jurisdiction of a non-military offense when an act or omission violates both this code and local criminal law, foreign or domestic. In such a case, a court-martial may be initiated only after the civilian authority has declined to prosecute or dismissed the charge, provided jeopardy has not attached. Jurisdiction over attempted crimes, conspiracy crimes, solicitation and accessory crimes must be determined by the underlying offense.
The first sentence means that O'Callahan v. Parker is the law for Massachusetts courts-martial, not Solorio v. United States. The new statute does not provide fixed terms of office for military judges. Under Art. 67A, court-martial appeals lie to the civilian Massachusetts Appeals Court.

No comments:

Post a Comment

Comments are subject to moderation and must be submitted under your real name. Anonymous comments will not be posted (even though the form seems to permit them).