What the Army Does to a Deserter Who Gets Caught

Thirty days. That's how long a soldier can be gone before the Army stops calling him absent and starts calling him a deserter, and once he's caught, that one word can follow him for the rest of his life. In this film: a private first class from Camp Humphreys who flew home on leave and never flew back, the form that puts his name in the FBI's national wanted file, why the clock on his crime stands still while he runs, the Marine who hid for 36 years under his mother's maiden name, a bicycle with no light, the jail hold with no bail, the one box on DD Form 616 that's worth a year, the last Personnel Control Facility in the Army, the haircut he pays for himself, the rule repeated every morning that isn't "don't run," the Chapter 10 deal almost every deserter is offered, the last American soldier executed for desertion, the bus station in Lawton, Oklahoma, and the federal bar on veterans' benefits that even a discharge upgrade may not lift. If you served, tell us in the comments: did you ever know someone who walked away from a unit, and what happened when they came back? Chapters: 0:00 Thirty days 2:05 Dropped from the rolls 3:22 The clock that stops 4:27 A bicycle with no light 5:36 No bail 6:30 Caught, or surrendered 8:01 The last one left 9:13 Three laminated sheets 10:36 Rule number one 12:10 DD Form 458 13:06 Chapter 10 14:34 The other road 16:17 Friday afternoon 17:49 Still a deserter? 19:39 Back to the bicycle Sources: Uniform Code of Military Justice, Articles 8, 43 and 85 38 C.F.R. § 3.12, Character of discharge James M. Branum, AWOL in the Army, National Lawyers Guild Military Law Task Force (2011) U.S. Army, on the Personnel Control Facility at Fort Sill (2020, 2023) Army Board for Correction of Military Records and Army Discharge Review Board case files (2009–2014) Army Times, on how the way a deserter returns can affect his case (2015) Associated Press and Mother Jones, on Army desertion and prosecution figures (2014) NPR and Stars and Stripes, on deserters who turned themselves in (2007) The appearance of U.S. Department of War (DoW) visual information does not imply or constitute DoW endorsement.