Most punitive articles of the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) address misconduct by the accused in a case. Article 98 is unusual because it points the other way. It polices the people who run the military justice system itself, making it an offense to drag out a case unnecessarily or to deliberately ignore the procedural protections the Code guarantees. Codified at 10 U.S.C. section 898 and titled “Noncompliance with procedural rules,” it is a safeguard meant to keep the machinery of military justice both prompt and fair.
Why the article exists
Military justice gives commanders and legal officers significant power over the lives of service members facing discipline. Cases move through apprehension, pretrial confinement decisions, investigation, referral, trial, and post-trial review, and at each stage the Code imposes rules designed to protect the accused’s rights and to keep the process moving. Article 98 backs those rules with the threat of criminal liability for the officials responsible for administering them. In doing so it reflects a recognition that procedural protections mean little if the people charged with honoring them can ignore or stall them without consequence.
The two offenses within Article 98
Article 98 defines two distinct offenses. The first targets unnecessary delay. It punishes a person who is responsible for unnecessary delay in the disposition of a case of a person accused of an offense under the Code. The second targets the deliberate disregard of procedural rules. It punishes a person who knowingly and intentionally fails to enforce or comply with any provision of the Code regulating the proceedings before, during, or after the trial of an accused. The two offenses guard different values: the first protects against languishing cases, and the second protects against the willful evasion of required procedures.
Elements of the unnecessary-delay offense
To convict on the delay branch, the government must prove that the accused was charged with a certain duty in connection with the disposition of a case of a person accused of an offense under the Code; that the accused knew of that duty; that delay occurred in the disposition of the case; that the accused was responsible for that delay; and that, under the circumstances, the delay was unnecessary. Each element matters. The accused must have had a recognized responsibility in the case, must have known of it, and the delay must have been both attributable to the accused and unnecessary in context. Reasonable delay, the kind inherent in investigating and processing a case properly, is not enough. The delay must have been needless.
Elements of the failure-to-comply offense
To convict on the second branch, the government must prove that the accused failed to enforce or comply with a certain provision of the Code regulating a proceeding before, during, or after trial; that the accused had the duty of enforcing or complying with that provision; and that the failure was knowing and intentional. The mental state is the defining feature here. This branch does not reach honest mistakes, oversights, or good-faith misunderstandings of complex procedure. It reaches the official who knows what the Code requires and deliberately declines to follow it. That high mental-state threshold keeps the article from criminalizing the ordinary errors that occur in any legal system and focuses it on intentional disregard.
A note on numbering
A reader cross-checking sources may encounter a numbering wrinkle. In the broader reorganization of the punitive articles, a different former provision that had once been designated section 898 was renumbered elsewhere in the Code. The offense described here, noncompliance with procedural rules, remains designated Article 98 at 10 U.S.C. section 898. Because the renumbering of military justice provisions has caused confusion across many articles, it is always wise to confirm the current designation and text against the present Manual for Courts-Martial and the United States Code when working with a specific case.
Defenses
Defenses follow from the demanding elements. For the delay branch, the defense may show that the accused had no duty in connection with the case, did not know of any such duty, was not in fact responsible for the delay, or that the delay was reasonable and necessary given the realities of investigating and processing the matter. For the compliance branch, the most important defense is the absence of the required mental state. A showing that the accused did not know of the procedural requirement, misunderstood it in good faith, or made an honest error rather than a knowing and intentional refusal defeats the charge, because the offense requires deliberate noncompliance. As always, the government must prove every element beyond a reasonable doubt.
Maximum punishment
Article 98 is not among the heavily punished offenses of the Code, and its maximum punishment is correspondingly modest compared with offenses such as willful disobedience or maltreatment. The President prescribes the maximum punishments and sentencing parameters for all UCMJ offenses and revises them periodically, so the controlling ceiling for an Article 98 charge should be confirmed against the current Manual for Courts-Martial and the executive order in effect at the time of the offense rather than assumed.
In practice
Charges under Article 98 are rare. The conduct it addresses is usually handled through administrative correction, professional accountability, or appellate remedies rather than a criminal prosecution of the official involved. When an accused suffers from unnecessary delay, the more common remedy is a speedy-trial motion or relief under the rules governing pretrial processing, not an Article 98 charge against the responsible official. When procedural rules are violated, the typical remedy is suppression, dismissal, or reversal on appeal that protects the affected accused, rather than a separate prosecution. Even so, Article 98 remains on the books as a backstop, a reminder that the officials who administer military justice are themselves bound by its rules and can, in a clear case of needless delay or knowing disregard, be held criminally accountable for failing to honor them.
Disclaimer
This article is provided strictly for general educational and informational purposes. It is intended to explain how the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ), the Rules for Courts-Martial, the Military Rules of Evidence, and related military administrative processes work as a matter of public legal education. It does not constitute legal advice, a legal opinion, or a recommendation about any particular case, and it is not a substitute for advice from a qualified military defense attorney who can evaluate the specific facts and command, service, and jurisdictional circumstances involved.
Reading this article, or contacting any website on which it appears, does not create an attorney-client relationship between the reader and any law firm, attorney, or author. Every court-martial, nonjudicial punishment action, administrative separation, and security-clearance matter turns on its own facts, the charged articles, the convening authority, the service branch, and the evidence, and outcomes vary widely from one case to another.
Military law also changes over time. The Military Justice Act of 2016 (effective January 1, 2019) and subsequent National Defense Authorization Acts renumbered and rewrote many punitive articles, revised the Article 32 preliminary hearing, and altered sentencing, clemency, and appellate procedures. Statutes, regulations, executive orders, the Manual for Courts-Martial, and decisions of the service Courts of Criminal Appeals and the Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces may have been amended, superseded, or reinterpreted after this article was written, and article numbers or procedures cited here may have changed.
For these reasons, no reader should act or decline to act based on this content without first consulting a licensed attorney experienced in military justice about their own situation. The author and publisher make no warranty, express or implied, as to the accuracy, completeness, timeliness, or current applicability of the information provided, and disclaim any liability for any action taken or not taken in reliance on it. If you are facing investigation, charges, or an adverse administrative action, time limits may apply, and you should seek qualified counsel promptly.