Marine Pleads to One CSAM Specification; Twelve Months and Bad Conduct Discharge

Marine Pleads to One CSAM Specification; Twelve Months and Bad Conduct Discharge

March 2025

Marine Corps Air Station Iwakuni, Japan

Marine Sergeant – E-5

Allegations: UCMJ Article 134 Possession of Child Pornography (2 specifications)

Facts

This was a Marine Sergeant assigned to a Marine Corps unit at MCAS Iwakuni facing a referred general court martial on two specifications of Article 134 possession of child pornography, with the matter routed through the Office of Special Trial Counsel as a covered offense. Maximum exposure on a referred Article 134 CSAM conviction at general court martial: years of confinement, possible Dishonorable Discharge, federal felony record, and sex offender registration.

The Government's case began with a Snapchat platform-side detection on three uploaded files matching the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children CyberTipline hash database. Snapchat submitted a CyberTipline Report to NCMEC. NCMEC routed the report to U.S. Army CID. The investigation was ultimately worked by NCIS Iwakuni. The investigation pulled subpoenaed records from MEGA, Yahoo, Google, and Snapchat. NCIS executed a search warrant on our client's residence. The Government's two preferred specifications charged a Snapchat upload window and a separate iPhone possession window approximately four months later.

Our client retained Bilecki at the NCIS investigation stage. Our client was placed in pretrial confinement immediately after his NCIS interview and remained in pretrial confinement through trial.

Tim Bilecki negotiated the dismissal of the specification involving the Snapchat uploads and limited the plea to possession of files on the iPhone. The agreement capped confinement at eighteen months and limited any punitive discharge to a bad-conduct discharge. The defense also worked through the file descriptions in the stipulation of fact. That kept the plea focused on the iPhone files supporting the conviction and distinguished them from the larger collection of images that did not meet the legal definition of child pornography.

At the general court martial, our client pleaded guilty to the iPhone specification. The Government withdrew the Snapchat specification per the Plea Agreement. The military judge adjudged a bad conduct discharge and twelve months of confinement, below the eighteen-month cap. Total forfeitures and reduction to E-1 were adjudged consistent with the Plea Agreement. Sex offender registration triggered.

Result: Guilty plea to one child-pornography possession specification; the other specification was withdrawn and dismissed. The adjudged sentence included 12 months of confinement and a bad-conduct discharge. The conviction retained sex-offender registration consequences.

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FAQ

Q: What did Bilecki narrow in the plea?
He negotiated dismissal of the Snapchat specification and limited the conviction to possession of the iPhone files. The defense also worked through the file descriptions so that the plea identified the material meeting the legal definition, rather than treating the entire collection as the same thing.

Q: What was the sentence?
The judge imposed twelve months of confinement, a bad conduct discharge, total forfeitures and reduction to E-1. The agreement had capped confinement at eighteen months. The possession conviction remained and carried sex offender registration consequences.