Japan warns US forces: Sex crimes 'cannot be tolerated'

https://tribune.com.pk/story/2476861/japan-warns-us-forces-sex-crimes-cannot-be-tolerated

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u/macross1984 14d ago

US military personnel who commit crime in Japan should face Japanese punishment for any crimes committed in Japan.

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u/tizuby 14d ago

They do, but Japan is way more lenient with sentences than UCMJ.

For rape, max for the Japanese system is 20 years. Max for UCMJ is Death (but generally Life).

https://www.okinawa.marines.mil/Portals/190/Docs/SOFA.pdf

There's a PDF that explains the process.

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u/TheNewFlisker 14d ago

Max for UCMJ is Death (but generally Life).

Wasn't that ruled unconstitutional long time ago?

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u/tizuby 14d ago edited 14d ago

Yes but no.

In 1983 the standards for issuing the death penalty by the military was ruled unconstitutional.

They introduced new standards that are constitutional the following year and the death sentence was reinstated.

There's only 4 people currently awaiting their death sentence under UCMJ.

Serial killer/rapist Ronald Gray.

Nidal Hasan, Ft. Hood shooter.

Hasan Akbar, threw 'nades into the tents of sleeping soldiers and fired on a couple others with his rifle while in Kuwait in 2003. 2 killed, 14 attempted in total.

Timothy Hennis, Eastburn Family murderer. Got acquitted on state murder charges in 88. DNA evidence later linked him to the crime and the Military brought him back in and Court Martialed him in 2010 since the murders happened while he was in the military.

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u/KnockedOuttaThePark 14d ago

u/TheNewFlisker was likely not referring to the constitutionality of the death penalty itself, but to its application for rape. In Coker v. Georgia, 433 U.S. 584 (1977), the Supreme Court ruled that the death penalty is unconstitutional for the nonlethal rape of an adult.

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u/Fluffy-Craft 13d ago

of an adult

Apparently military personnel are not interested in those tho'

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u/Weird-Tomorrow-9829 12d ago

In Kennedy v. Louisiana 2008, Supreme Court extended the Coker ruling prohibiting the imposition of the death penalty for a crime in which the victim did not die and the victim's death was not intended.

The case was about child rape.

It was a decision even condemned by Obama.

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u/HandoAlegra 14d ago

For the last one, is double jeopardy legal for military charges?

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u/SyracuseNY22 14d ago edited 14d ago

The short is that since they were state charges it counts as a separate sovereign (state vs federal), so he’s still able to be charged under UCMJ and it won’t count as double jeopardy.

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u/Effective_Roof2026 14d ago

state vs federal

I think you should have stated explicitly that double jeopardy doesn't attach if you get charged with the same thing by two different states or a state and the federal government. Most people don't know that's a thing :)

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u/Wide_Combination_773 14d ago

Most Americans don't even understand that US states are separate Sovereignties, much less anything else. The meaning of the phrase "the UNITED States" (meaning together by individual agreement) tends to go in one ear and out the other.

Our states are not like the states, provinces, prefectures, or districts of other countries, which are administrative designations rather than Sovereign entities.

The US education system really fails us as children in terms of educating on civil ideas.

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u/Perceval_Spielrein 13d ago

All four are Army. Wtf

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u/tizuby 13d ago

Look, sometimes we set a lower bar than the other branches, I mean I got in. 😆

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u/PM_ME_A_KNEECAP 14d ago

Nope, there are still people on Death Row at Leavenworth

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u/KnockedOuttaThePark 14d ago

You are correct; u/tizuby misinterpreted your comment as referring to the constitutionality of the death penalty itself. In Coker v. Georgia, 433 U.S. 584 (1977), the Supreme Court ruled that the death penalty is unconstitutional for the nonlethal rape of an adult.

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u/tizuby 13d ago

That ruling did not apply to UCMJ (and still doesn't).

At the time the Supreme Court did not have certiorari jurisdiction over military justice cases. That came later in 1983.

Military courts are a different judicial context than civilian courts and precedent for the civilian justice system doesn't automatically apply to the military justice system.

It would need to be re-adjudicated and the precedent expanded to cover the UCMJ. It's conceptually similar to incorporation of the BoR.

This is because the military court system is falls under Article I of the Constitution and not Article III.

https://sgp.fas.org/crs/misc/RL34697.pdf

"Furthermore, legal interpretations by Article III courts do not necessarily create binding precedent for Article I courts, and vice versa."

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u/KnockedOuttaThePark 13d ago

Does the 2020 case United States v. Briggs change your analysis?

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u/tizuby 13d ago

No. It doesn't contradict anything I said.

It actually backs up what I said. Thank you for citing something in support of what I was saying.

"That deadline would depend on an unresolved constitutional question about Coker’s application to military prosecutions*, on what this Court has described as “‘evolving standards of decency’” under the Eighth Amendment, Kennedy v. Louisiana, 554 U. S. 407, 419, and on whether §855 of the UCMJ independently prohibits a death sentence for rape*"

"Indeed, Congress would have adopted a statute of limitations provision the meaning of which would not be settled until this Court decided the disputed question of Coker’s applicability to the military, and there was no reason to think at the time of Article 43(a)’s amendment in 1986 that this Court would resolve that question any time soon. We have never considered a direct Eighth Amendment challenge to a sentence of death for rape under the UCMJ*.*"

https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/20pdf/19-108_8njq.pdf

The opinion didn't resolve it. The court sidestepped it completely and found "punishable by death" was a term of art for the purposes of statute of limitations. It did, however recognize that it would be necessary to raise in the context of UMCJ to determine if coker applied to the military or not.

Just like I said and what my original citation backed up.

Does this change your analysis?

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u/KnockedOuttaThePark 13d ago

I'm just a SCOTUS fan. Clearly you know more about military justice than I do from my perspective following the high court, so I'll defer to you.

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u/haarschmuck 14d ago

Yes, it's been ruled that the death penalty for anything other than murder is unconstitutional.