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No Plans to End 30 Years of Service By Michael Bartish, Springstead Bartish Borgula & Lynch, PLLC
Lieutenant Colonel Michael Bartish is currently the team leader for the 117th Legal Operations Detachment—Las Vegas Team. He is also a founding member of Springstead Bartish Borgula & Lynch, PLLC, a criminal defense firm specializing in state and federal criminal defense litigation. He lives in Rockford, Mich., with his brilliant wife, Anne (also an attorney), and his four children. ©2021 Michael Bartish. All rights reserved.
In May 1991, I was an 18-year-old senior at St. Xavier High School in Cincinnati. Earlier that spring, I had been accepted to the University of Notre Dame—my “dream school.” We had just received Notre Dame’s financial aid package in the mail. Notre Dame’s package was significantly less than what was offered to me by other comparable universities—but those schools were not Notre Dame. Even as an 18-year-old, it was hard for me to justify the additional cost that my parents would incur because of my choice to attend Notre Dame. So, I made the decision to enroll in the Army ROTC program at Notre Dame. I do not come from a military family. Military service was not even on my or my family’s radar back in 1991. I was doing this strictly for the scholarship money. I figured I would join ROTC for the scholarship, complete my four years of mandatory military service, and move on to a regular life as soon as I fulfilled my military commitment. Somewhere along the way, however, I stumbled across the U.S. Army Judge Advocate General’s Corps ( JAG Corps). Now, 30 years later, I am still serving in the Army JAG Corps Reserves and loving every minute of it.
The First Four Years When I tell people that I am a JAG officer, or Judge Advocate ( JA), in the U.S. Army Reserves, it naturally elicits a number of questions: • What exactly does a JAG do? • How do you do all those things while still maintaining a civilian practice? • Didn’t that show get canceled years ago? • Have you ever screamed “did you order the CODE RED?” at some colonel? Each branch of the U.S. military has a legal component led by a senior legal advisor, designated as The Judge Advocate General (TJAG). The U.S. Army was the first military branch to designate such an office. JAs are tasked with providing an entire array of legal services necessary for a fully functioning legal system. JAs must, of course, be versed in all aspects of military law, including military justice, national security law, administrative and civil law, and contract and fiscal law. However, JAs must also be versed in civilian law 22 • THE FEDERAL LAWYER • November/December 2021
such as real estate, procurement, estate planning, and really any other specialty in the civilian sector. In fact, you could think of the most obscure area of the law, and I promise you there is some JA out there who specializes in it. During a military career, a JA should expect to serve in a myriad of different positions. Most Army JAs begin their military legal careers as a legal assistance or client services attorney. This position is most akin to a civilian legal aid attorney. Believe it or not, young soldiers will occasionally get themselves embroiled in legal issues such as vehicle purchase from less than reputable auto dealerships, magazine subscription contracts, and debt collection issues, among others. The legal assistance attorney assists soldiers with these issues and will sometimes negotiate on the soldier’s behalf with these companies. As a JA gains more experience, they will typically move on to a trial counsel position. A trial counsel typically serves as a prosecutor for a particular Army unit to which he or she is assigned. A trial counsel advises the various commanders who serve within his or her unit, makes charging recommendations to the commanders for violations of the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ), and ushers those cases to court-martials (trials) once they are referred. Often, following a stint as a trial counsel, a JA will move on to serving as a Trial Defense Services (TDS) counsel, which is akin to a public defender. Every member of the military charged with a violation of the UCMJ is assigned a TDS counsel to represent them at courts-martial. TDS attorneys have one job within the military, to protect and defend the rights of the soldier (client). While not every JA ends up serving in these positions during their first tour, this is generally the most common career progression.
Immediate Trial Experience at Fort Hood, Texas I spent my four first years in the military as an attorney in JAG Corps serving at Fort Hood, Texas. I spent one year as a legal assistance attorney, two years as a trial counsel, and my final year as a TDS attorney. During that brief four-year period (from the ages of 26-30), I tried, as lead counsel, six attempted murder contested jury trials, three first-degree murder contested jury trials, and four other miscellaneous felony contested
