CAAF issues opinion in Williams
CAAF has issued its opinion in United States v. Williams, No. 08-0339/AF, available here. Judge Erdmann wrote for the majority. Judge Stucky, joined by Judge Ryan, concurred in part and dissented in part. The decision awarded an additional 86 days of confinement credit to the accused. I’ll try to write more about the decision later tonight.
The disagreement between the majority and dissent looks to be the standard of review.
I’m all in favor of military judges liberally granted additional credit for pretrial confinement. Gov’t shenanigans, mis-steps, screwups, mistakes, and other misbehavior, whether intentional or resulting from incompetence or negligence, should be dealt with swiftly and surely. Justice is a two-way street.
That being said, I’m not entirely sure the military judge abused his discretion in this case.
I’m not entirely sure “standard of review” means much of anything.
Erdmann is Justice Kennedy. I wager he will decide a lot of the “difficult” cases this term.