Civilians Getting Away With Crimes Overseas While Accompanying the Armed Forces: Waiting for the Implementation of the Military Extraterritorial Jurisdiction Act of 2000 and the Judicial Alternative

In the aftermath of World War II, the United States established treaty relationships with nations in both Europe and Asia regarding the status of members of the U.S. armed forces, the civilian components, and their dependents in the host nations. These agreements, which came to be called Status of Forces Agreements (SOFAs), set out among other matters, jurisdictional rules for crimes committed by persons with status under the SOFA. These rules were designed to meet the interests of both the country of a visiting force and the host nation in pursing justice. The rules establishing which nation (the United States or the host nation) would have the power to pursuing justice. The rules establishing which nation (the United States or the host nation) would have the power to punish a person provided for both civilians and military members alike with the understanding that the United States armed forces could in fact punish both categories of personnel. However, the 1957 U.S. Supreme Court case Reid v. Covert, which found the courts-martial of two cases of civilian wives murdering their military husbands overseas to be constitutionally flawed, and progeny severely curtailed the ability of the U.S. armed forces to criminally punish civilians (practically limiting the court-martial jurisdiction to times only of Congressionally declared war). Meanwhile, the preexisting SOFA provisions have never been changed.