United States v. Smith

Opinion of the Court

Ferguson, Judge:

This is a poorly tried case. Although the accused’s conviction of housebreaking and offering violence against his superior officer, in violation, respectively, of Uniform Code of Military Justice, Articles 130 and 90, 10 USC §§ 930, 890, and sentence to bad-conduct discharge, confinement and forfeitures have been affirmed below, the record reflects a surprising inattention to preparation for, and conduct of, a crim*417inal trial. Such led directly to our grant of accused’s petition on three issues dealing with the action of the law officer in permitting trial…