Yes, military attorneys are absolutely authorized to request redress for this clear procedural violation. When a service member submits a timely rebuttal to a negative evaluation report, military regulations mandate that the rebuttal be physically or digitally attached to the evaluation and become a permanent part of the official record. If a command or personnel office fails to include the rebuttal in the official system (like iPERMS), they have denied the soldier their fundamental right to have their side of the story heard.
The primary recourse is to file an appeal with the service’s Board for Correction of Military Records (BCMR/BCNR). This is the highest level of administrative review and is specifically designed to correct errors and injustices in a member’s permanent file. The attorney will help the soldier prepare a detailed application for the board. The application will include a copy of the original evaluation, a copy of the rebuttal that was submitted, and proof of its timely submission (such as a signed receipt or a dated email).
The legal argument to the board is straightforward: a mandatory procedural step was omitted, resulting in a prejudicial error in the soldier’s official records. The attorney will request that the BCMR correct this injustice by ordering that the rebuttal be formally added to the evaluation in the soldier’s permanent file. The board routinely grants this type of relief, as it is a clear administrative error that is easily correctable.