Bilecki Exonerates Army CW2 in Sodomy Case Declared “Hopeless” by Free Attorney
Oct 06, 2017
OUTCOME: The trial lasted about a week, culminating in the jury acquitting the Warrant Officer of all charges and specifications.
A retirement-eligible helicopter pilot was falsely accused of sexual assault by another male Soldier in his unit. After being told that the case was “hopeless” by the first free military defense attorn...ey who was detailed to represent him, this Army Warrant knew that he needed a fighter in his corner to actually investigate the case and prove his innocence.
Court martial lawyer Timothy Bilecki was retained and traveled to Fort Polk, Louisiana, to view the scene, interview witnesses and prepare the defense. Nearly a year later, the case was tried before a panel of officers. Bilecki’s defense strategy centered on a thorough cross-examination of the alleged victim, during which he exposed inconsistencies and motives for fabricating the allegations.
The trial lasted about a week, culminating in the jury acquitting the Warrant Officer of all charges and specifications. Bilecki’s defense successfully highlighted the flaws in the accuser’s story, leading to the exoneration of the Warrant Officer.
Military law
Sodomy | Case Result
Sep 01, 2017
OUTCOME: Not Guilty of All Charges and Specifications.
A retirement eligible helicopter pilot was falsely accused of sexual assault by another male Soldier in his unit. He was told that the case was “hopeless” by the free military defense attorney detailed... to represent him. This Army pilot knew that he needed a fighter in his corner to actually investigate the case and prove his innocence. Court martial lawyer Timothy Bilecki was retained and traveled to Fort Polk, Louisiana to view the scene, interview witnesses and prepare the defense. Nearly a year later, the case was tried before a panel of officers. Mr. Bilecki conducted a devastating cross examination of the alleged victim exposing his motive to lie and make up the allegations. While the trial took nearly a week, it didn’t take the jury long to reach a verdict. FULL ACQUITTAL. Not Guilty of All Charges and Specifications.
Military law
E-3 Falls Prey to OSI’s Catch a Predator Sting, Bilecki Secures Acquittal
Aug 18, 2017
OUTCOME: The jury found him not guilty based on our entrapment defense after only one hour and fifteen minutes of deliberations.
Charges were preferred against an Army Soldier when he unwittingly replied to an online ad placed by the OSI in Hawaii. In a sting operation similar to the one used on the television show “To Catch a P...redator,” OSI’s ads on Craigslist entice service members into clicking and replying to allegedly underage girls.
Once the service member answers the ad, an OSI Special Agent engages the target and gives him a fabricated age (usually very young, 14 or 15). The chats continue until the service member agrees to meet the person at a pre-determined meeting point – typically a house on JBPHH. When the service member arrives at the house, he is arrested, taken into custody, interrogated, and later charged with attempted sexual assault on a minor.
After being retained to defend the Soldier, a court martial lawyer in Hawaii, Timothy Bilecki, used an entrapment defense to bring the case to a fully contested jury trial. During cross-examination, Mr. Bilecki exposed several fundamental flaws in the OSI sting operation. Namely, that OSI was not following their ICAC and entrapment training and was engaging in unlawful inducements – including sending several pictures of an adult even though the persona was supposed to be of a minor.
At the end of the trial, it was clear that our client was in no way seeking out a minor to have sex with. The jury found him not guilty based on our entrapment defense after only one hour and fifteen minutes of deliberations.
Military law
No Jail Time for E-5 in Minor Sex Assault Due to Entrapment and Mistake of Fact
Jul 21, 2017
OUTCOME: The jury deliberated and found our client not guilty of attempted sexual assault of a minor.
An Air Force Staff Sergeant was charged with attempted sexual assault when he answered a deceptive ad posted by Hawaii’s OSI in the “casual encounters” section of Craigslist. The ad in question was for... a no-strings-attached relationship. Nowhere in the ad was age mentioned.
The Airman answered the ad and began chatting with the undercover OSI agent. The agent stated that “she” was only 15 years old, but our client did not believe the person he was chatting with and thought he might be getting “catfished.”
OSI then sent multiple pictures of an adult female to the Airman, and he believed the person he was chatting with was an adult based on those pictures. The Airman requested a meeting prior to engaging in any sexual activity to verify that he was speaking with an adult. OSI then sent a 28-year-old Technical Sergeant as the decoy girl to meet our client at the Hickam Gym. Content that the person he was speaking with was not underage, the Airman agreed via text to meet up in a hotel room on base.
When the Air Force Sergeant arrived at the hotel room, he was arrested, taken into custody, interrogated and charged with attempted sexual assault of a minor and communicating indecent language to a minor.
Military sexual assault lawyer Timothy Bilecki and his client turned down the 18-month plea deal that the government offered. At trial, the defense raised both entrapment and mistake of fact as to age defenses and pointed out the numerous flaws in OSI’s sting operation case.
The jury deliberated and found our client not guilty of attempted sexual assault of a minor. However, they did find him guilty of communicating indecent language to a minor (for language sent prior to when our client saw the 28-year-old decoy). The jury sentenced our client to a Bad Conduct Discharge but no jail time.
Military law
Attempted Sexual Assault of a Minor, Multiple Charges | Yokosuka, Japan | June 2017 | Case Results
Jun 23, 2017
OUTCOME: Attempted Sexual Assault of a Minor, Multiple Charges | Yokosuka, Japan | June 2017 | Case Results
A Navy Pilot O-3 was accused of attempted sexual assault of a minor, finding himself in the crosshairs of the NCIS while on temporary duty in Okinawa, Japan. Similar to many other sting operations, he ...was targeted after answering an ad on the “Whisper” dating app, which had been posted deceptively by NCIS.
After the Officer began chatting with the NCIS undercover investigator, the agent stated that her age was 14 years old but sent a picture of a 22-year-old adult female. After seeing the photographs, the Officer believed the person he was chatting with was an adult. Twenty additional images of this adult female confirmed his belief that he was speaking with a woman of legal age. The O-3 and the NCIS agent agreed to meet up at a public location on base. When the Officer arrived, he was arrested, interrogated, and later charged.
The O-3 quickly retained a noted court martial attorney in Japan, Tim Bilecki, to represent his interests in court. Mr. Bilecki immediately began working on the case, refusing the initial plea deal offered by the government, which would have about guaranteed four years in confinement for our client. After skillfully cross-examining both the NCIS agent who was running the sting operation and the undercover investigator conducting the chats, Bilecki quickly proved his case for entrapment and secured a not-guilty verdict for his client on all counts.
Military law
Bilecki Negotiates Plea for Army O-3 Caught in “Swift Traveler” Teen Sex Sting
May 19, 2017
OUTCOME: Bilecki and the prosecution, a plea deal was struck, limiting our client’s confinement time to only 18 months.
An Army Captain was caught in a joint FBI – PBI (Philippine Bureau of Investigations) operation entitled “Operation Swift Traveler,” which sought to locate and apprehend adults seeking to travel to the... Philippines to have sex with minors and trafficked persons. While the details of this case are extraordinarily complicated, our client was accused of seeking out minors in the Philippines and later traveling to the Philippines with the intent to have sex with them.
The investigation into this case took over a year while our client was pending charges. Once our client was charged, he was facing a maximum sentence of several hundred years in prison. An Article 120 UCMJ sexual assault attorney in Korea, Tim Bilecki, was retained early on in the investigation and utilized a defense investigator, a computer forensic expert and several other experts located in the Philippines. The defense team understood that the government would likely be seeking 40 or more years in confinement.
Bilecki Law Group utilized our assets, and Mr. Bilecki created a great deal of leverage in the case and flew to Korea to negotiate perhaps the best Pre-Trial Agreement of his career. After a week of hard negotiations between Mr. Bilecki and the prosecution, a plea deal was struck, limiting our client’s confinement time to only 18 months.
Other high-profile cases involving Operation Swift Traveler:
http://www.sunstar.com.ph/pampanga/local-news/2016/10/07/2-get-ax-attempted-trafficking-3-minors-502326
http://globalnation.inquirer.net/130701/100-nude-photos-of-children-seized-in-us-came-from-ph-nbi
Military law
1st Amendment Exonerates E-5 for Explicit Anime, Sentence Reduced
Mar 24, 2017
OUTCOME: Not guilty regarding anime porn, not guilty of distribution of child pornography and guilty by acceptations and substitution of possession of child pornography. Sentenced to one year in confinement, reduced to six months and a bad conduct discharge.
In one of the most unique pornography cases Bilecki Law Group has ever tried, an Air Force Staff Sergeant stationed in Korea was charged with possession and distribution of child pornography and allege...d illegal anime images after the government observed “files of interest” being transferred to his IP address.
Unbeknownst to most service members, military law enforcement monitors various IP addresses using software called “grid cop,” looking for files of interest being transferred from one IP to another. Here, this led the NCIS to conduct a search and seizure of the Sergeant’s digital media.
No live images or videos of child pornography were found on Sergeant’s computers, but remnants of files that may have been child pornography were found in the unallocated space on the hard drive – meaning those files were deleted. The government also found Japanese anime, manga and hentai on the computer and charged the SSgt with possession and distribution of child pornography for the files found in allocated space as well as the anime files which were saved on the computer.
Immediately after being retained, Bilecki's Article 134 UCMJ child pornography defense team utilized its own defense investigator – who is also a certified digital forensic examiner – to do a complete review of all the digital media in the case. This review alone took over 100 person-hours.
Bilecki learned that our client was using peer-to-peer file-sharing software to look for and download Japanese hentai, manga and anime. It also showed that in the process of mass downloading the anime, child pornography may have also been inadvertently downloaded. We also learned that the user downloaded all the files using one computer and then transferred the files to another computer. Once the downloaded files were on the second computer, the hentai, manga and anime were saved and cataloged, and any suspected files of child pornography were deleted – placing them in unallocated space.
The government continued to pursue charges for both the deleted child pornography and the anime, and the defense team took the case to trial. At trial, Bilecki utilized Dr. Darlington, an expert in the field of Japanese anime, to provide context to the charged images, supporting the defense that a service member has a First Amendment right to possess anime, even if distasteful to some. We also utilized our computer forensic expert to show that our client was clearly not seeking out child pornography and was actively seeking Japanese anime and may have inadvertently downloaded child pornography during the mass downloads.
The case was tried by a military judge, and our client was found not guilty of all charges and specifications related to the Japanese anime and not guilty of distribution of child pornography. The judge, however, found our client guilty by exceptions and substitutions for possessing certain images of child pornography. The basis for the judge’s findings on this charge was that our client maintained dominion and control of the files when they were transferred from the download machine to the other computer. The military judge sentenced our client to 12 months of confinement and a bad conduct discharge. Clemency was later granted, reducing the sentence by 6 months. Notably, at the moment when the court martial attorney, Tim Bilecki, was retained, the plea deal on the table was 4 years of confinement.
Military law
Bilecki Has Perry Mason Moment Questioning Stabbing Witness, Client Acquitted
Mar 24, 2017
OUTCOME: The panel deliberated for less than 20 minutes before returning the Not Guilty verdict.
An Army Sergeant stationed in Okinawa was charged with allegations of stabbing someone at a bar fight in March of 2017. The Sergeant retained a recognized court martial attorney in Okinawa, Tim Bilecki..., less than two weeks prior to trial. After being retained, Mr. Bilecki quickly flew to Okinawa and built a defense. After interviewing numerous witnesses and actually touring the scene where the crime occurred – a bar in the Sunabe Seawall area of Okinawa – it was apparent that the lighting conditions, view planes and level of intoxication by the eyewitnesses who stated they saw our client conducted the stabbing could all be called into question.
In less than two weeks, Mr. Bilecki was able to obtain an expert witness in the area of eyewitness misidentifications, fly that witness to Japan and have them testify to the jury and educate them about the inherent unreliability of eyewitness identifications.
The highlight of the trial occurred during the defense case in chief when the person who we believe actually did the stabbing invoked his rights while on the witness stand, which was a true Perry Mason moment. The panel deliberated for less than 20 minutes before returning the Not Guilty verdict.
Military law
Bilecki Has Perry Mason Moment Questioning Stabbing Witness, Client Acquitted
Mar 24, 2017
OUTCOME:
An Army Sergeant stationed in Okinawa was charged with allegations of stabbing someone at a bar fight in March of 2017. The Sergeant retained a recognized court martial attorney in Okinawa, Tim Bilecki..., less than two weeks prior to trial. After being retained, Mr. Bilecki quickly flew to Okinawa and built a defense. After interviewing numerous witnesses and actually touring the scene where the crime occurred – a bar in the Sunabe Seawall area of Okinawa – it was apparent that the lighting conditions, view planes and level of intoxication by the eyewitnesses who stated they saw our client conducted the stabbing could all be called into question.
In less than two weeks, Mr. Bilecki was able to obtain an expert witness in the area of eyewitness misidentifications, fly that witness to Japan and have them testify to the jury and educate them about the inherent unreliability of eyewitness identifications.
The highlight of the trial occurred during the defense case in chief when the person who we believe actually did the stabbing invoked his rights while on the witness stand, which was a true Perry Mason moment. The panel deliberated for less than 20 minutes before returning the Not Guilty verdict.
Military law
Aggravated Assault with a means likely to produce death or GBH (Stabbing) | Case Result
Mar 03, 2017
OUTCOME: The panel deliberated for less than 20 minutes before returning the Not Guilty verdict.
One of the most gratifying cases our team has ever won. An Army Sergeant stationed in Okinawa was on trial for allegedly stabbing someone at a bar fight in March 2017. Defense Attorney Tim Bilecki was ...able to get him full acquitted of all charges and specifications following a two-day trial in front of an enlisted panel.
Mr. Bilecki was retained less than two weeks prior to trial, He was able to quickly assemble a team, fly to Okinawa, and build a solid defense. After interviewing numerous witnesses, our team toured the scene where the crime occurred. The crime scene was a bar in the Sunabe Seawall area of Okinawa.
It was quickly apparent to us that the lighting conditions, view planes, and level of intoxication by the eye witnesses claiming our client perpetrated the stabbing should all be called into question. In less than two weeks, Mr. Bilecki was able to obtain an expert witness in the area of eyewitness misidentifications. He flew that witness to Japan and had him testify to the jury. This expert educated the jury about the inherent unreliability of eyewitness identifications.
The highlight of the trial occurred when the individual we believe actually did the stabbing invoked his 5th amendment right while on the witness stand after relentless cross examination. It was a true Perry Mason moment! The panel deliberated for less than 20 minutes before returning the Not Guilty verdict.
