Military Police contains information about military police functions in maneuver and mobility support, area security, law and order, internment/resettlement, and police intelligence operations.
Issue link: https://militarypolice.epubxp.com/i/383260
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MILITARY POLICE
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killed. In retaliation, Soldiers of the 24th armed themselves
and—on the hot, rainy night of 23 August 1917—initiated a
2-hour gun fght with civilians in Houston. Four Soldiers and
15 white civilians were killed during the incident, making
this the only race riot in U.S. history in which more whites
than blacks were killed. The incident also resulted in the
largest murder trial and the largest court-martial in U.S.
history. Nineteen of the accused rioters were sentenced to
death by hanging, and 63 received life sentences. Ironically,
Corporal Baltimore was among the frst group hanged.
During World War I, 36 U.S. Army Soldiers were
executed—all by hanging—from 5 November 1917 to
20 June 1919. Eleven of these hangings were conducted in
France; the remaining 25 were carried out in the United
States.
The only commissioned offcer to be executed was hanged
in the Philippines on 18 March 1926. Second Lieutenant
John S. Thompson, who was stationed at Fort McKinley,
near Manila, had shot and killed his 18-year-old fancé from
Memphis, Tennessee, almost a year earlier. Thompson was
the frst American offcer ever convicted of a murder charge
by court-martial in peacetime and ordered to forfeit his life.
Thompson's remains were returned to New York for burial
by his family.
The U.S. military executed 160 Service members from
1942 to 1961 (not including prisoners of war, war criminals,
or saboteurs executed by military authorities from 1942 to
1951); 106 of these were put to death for murder (including
21 involving rape), 53 for rape, and one (Private Eddie
Slovik) for desertion. Of the 160 executions, 157 were carried
out by the U.S. Army. The three remaining executions—one
in 1950 and two in 1954—were conducted by the U.S. Air
Force. The U.S. Navy has not executed anyone since 1849.
A total of 10 military executions (all by hanging) have
been conducted by the U.S. Army under the provisions of
the original Title 10, U.S. Code, Chapter 47 (10 USC 47),
"Uniform Code of Military Justice," of 5 May 1950. The frst
four of these executions were carried out at the Kansas State
Penitentiary near Lansing, Kansas; the remaining six were
conducted at the USDB, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. The
last U.S. military execution conducted was the 13 April 1961
hanging of Army Private First Class John A. Bennett for the
rape and attempted murder of an 11-year-old Austrian girl.
The execution was carried out 4 years after it was approved
by President Dwight D. Eisenhower.
The death penalty is still a possible punishment under
the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Male U.S. military
death row inmates are housed at the USDB. There are
presently six inmates on death row at the USDB—the
most recent addition being Nadal Hasan, who fatally shot
13 people and injured more than 30 others in a mass shooting
at Fort Hood, Texas, on 5 November 2009. Although all
previous USDB executions have involved hanging, lethal
injection has been designated as the current method to be
used for military executions.
Approval for the execution of Army Private Ronald A.
Gray, who has been on death row since 1988, was granted
by President George W. Bush on 28 July 2008. Gray—who
was convicted of a rape, two murders, and an attempted
murder of three women (two of them Army Soldiers and the
third a civilian taxi driver whose body was found at Fort
Bragg, North Carolina)—was scheduled to be executed on
10 December 2008. On 26 November 2008, a federal judge
issued a stay of execution.
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On 26 January 2012, the Army
Court of Criminal Appeals denied relief in Gray's case.
Gray's lawyers plan to appeal to the Court of Appeals for the
Armed Forces.
Endnotes:
1
Army Regulation (AR) 190-55, U.S. Army Corrections
System: Procedures for Military Executions, 23 July 2010.
2
John C. Fitzpatrick, editor, The Writings of George
Washington From the Original Manuscript Sources, 1745–1799,