This section lets parties take depositions in court-martial matters, requires notice to other parties, allows certain officers to authenticate depositions, and lets some depositions be read as evidence if specific conditions are met.
Sec. 432.074. DEPOSITIONS. (a) At any time after charges have been signed, as provided in Section 432.051, a party may take oral or written depositions unless the military judge, a court-martial without a military judge hearing the case, or, if the case is not being heard, an authority competent to convene a court-martial for the trial of those charges forbids it for good cause. If a deposition is to be taken before charges are referred for trial, the authority may designate commissioned officers to represent the prosecution and the defense and may authorize those officers to take the deposition of any witness. (b) The party at whose instance a deposition is to be taken shall give to every other party reasonable written notice of the time and place for taking the deposition. (c) Depositions may be taken before and authenticated by any military or civil officer authorized to administer oaths by laws of the state or by the laws of the place where the deposition is taken. (d) A duly authenticated deposition taken on reasonable notice to the other parties, to the extent otherwise admissible under the rules of evidence, may be read in evidence before a military court or commission, or in a proceeding before a court of inquiry or military board, if it appears that: (1) the witness resides or is beyond the state in which the court-martial or court of inquiry is ordered to sit, or more than 100 miles from the place of trial or hearing; (2) the witness because of death, age, sickness, bodily infirmity, imprisonment, military necessity, nonamenability to process, or other reasonable cause, is unable or refuses to appear and testify in person at the place of trial or hearing; or (3) the present location of the witness is unknown. Acts 1987, 70th Leg., ch. 147, Sec. 1, eff. Sept. 1, 1987.