United States v. Harris, 201600207

Appellant pled guilty at a general court-martial to attempted robbery, desertion, and aggravated arson; sentence included 8 years confinement (excess suspended), reduction to E‑1, forfeitures, and dishonorable discharge.
Appellant was arrested 12 May 2015 and placed in pretrial confinement; an Initial Reviewing Officer (IRO) conducted a R.C.M. 305(i)(2) review on 20 May 2015 and prepared a memorandum with an attached enclosure containing factual findings.
Defense requested copies of all R.C.M. 305 materials on 15 September 2015; government replied 7 October 2015 promising production but did not provide the enclosure until 16 January 2016 (four days before trial).
Defense discovered the missing enclosure shortly before trial and moved for 126 days of confinement credit (one day per day of government noncompliance from the discovery request until production).
The military judge found a technical R.C.M. 305 violation but awarded only 23 days of credit (7 Oct 2015 to 29 Oct 2015), reasoning defense should have moved to compel production at the 29 Oct Article 39(a) motions session and to avoid a windfall.
On appeal, the court affirmed, applying precedent that credit runs from when the required event should have occurred until it does, but upheld the judge’s exercise of discretion in limiting credit to 23 days because the defense delayed litigating the issue.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether appellant is entitled to day‑for‑day confinement credit for the full 126 days of R.C.M. 305(i)(2)(D) noncompliance	Appellant: government’s failure to produce IRO factual findings from 15 Sep 2015 to 16 Jan 2016 entitles him to 126 days credit (one day per day of noncompliance)	Government: R.C.M. 305(k) awards credit only for confinement served "as a result of" the violation; appellant cannot show he was confined because of the missing enclosure, so no credit or limited credit is warranted	Court affirmed the military judge: precedent requires credit from the date an event should have occurred until it did, but judge did not abuse discretion in awarding only 23 days because defense unreasonably delayed litigation and judge reasonably managed proceedings

United States v. McCants, 39 M.J. 91 (C.M.A. 1994) (established that failure to provide IRO memorandum warrants day‑for‑day credit under R.C.M. 305)
United States v. Plowman, 53 M.J. 511 (N‑M. Ct. Crim. App. 2000) (construed “as a result of such noncompliance” to mean credit runs from when the required event should have occurred until it occurs)
United States v. Moore, 55 M.J. 772 (N‑M. Ct. Crim. App. 2001) (applied McCants and Plowman to require day‑for‑day credit from the date of noncompliance to the date of compliance)
United States v. Adcock, 65 M.J. 18 (C.A.A.F. 2007) (standard of review for military judge’s discretionary rulings)
United States v. Atkinson, 74 M.J. 645 (N‑M. Ct. Crim. App. 2015) (legal standards for de novo review of entitlement to pretrial confinement credit)