D. Monique Brown, Esq.

As a Navy JAG Officer, Monique has more than 25 years of experience both on active duty and in the Reserve component, earning a stellar reputation as an expert in criminal litigation.  In uniform, she has served – and excelled – in every legal position available: As a defense counsel, prosecutor, staff judge advocate advising commanders, preliminary hearing officer presiding over Article 32 hearings, and as a military judge presiding over courts-martial.  She has experience in deployed environments and served as Commanding Officer of the Navy Reserve Unit responsible for military justice policy, where she led a team of talented senior attorneys through a period of great change to the Uniform Code of Military Justice while also personally serving as a voting member on the Navy and Marine Corps Clemency and Parole Board.  She continues to serve as an O-6 in the Navy Reserve.

In her civilian career, Monique served for five years as a federal prosecutor, where she successfully prosecuted and litigated numerous federal misdemeanor and federal bench and jury trials from inception through sentencing as first-chair.  During her time in this role, she was known for her mastery of criminal rules of evidence and procedure and never lost a felony jury trial.  She also authored and argued appellate cases before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit.  She has served as an adjunct professor for several institutions, including during her first deployment, when she took on the role of professor to ensure deployed service members could continue their higher-level education pursuits while deployed.  Most recently, Monique served as an Administrative Judge in the Dallas, Texas, area, where she adjudicated a variety of complex cases.

A native of Norfolk, Virginia, Monique graduated from Pittsburg State University with her Bachelor’s and earned her law degree from Indiana University School of Law-Indianapolis, where she was named to the Dean’s List each year and received the Leland B. Cross Scholarship Award.  She interned with the Honorable V. Sue Shield, U.S. District Court Magistrate, and graduated top of her law school class in 2000, after which she commissioned as a judge advocate in the Navy.

As a Navy JAG, Monique was selected to stand up and lead the legal department for a newly-formed regional command where she established and implemented military justice processes that were eventually mandated across all Navy Reserve Force regions.  She developed significant experience in conducting and adjudicating command investigations.  As a uniformed defense counsel, she represented servicemembers in numerous complex and serious cases involving drugs, firearms, murder, gang rape, and domestic violence.  She also mentored junior judge advocates in their cases.  While deployed to Djibouti, as the most senior U.S. military legal advisor on the continent of Africa, Monique worked closely with senior commanders and their staffs and with U.S. State Department officials across the spectrum of legal issues faced in a deployed environment.  She also served as the sole legal advisor to the installation commander, where her portfolio also included advising on military justice cases.  In a later deployment, she served as the head of a section of joint service attorneys responsible for reviewing abuse allegations.  She directed, reviewed and assessed investigations, drafted and forwarded recommendations regarding abuse allegations to convening authorities for appropriate disposition.  As a military judge who presided over all phases of bench and jury criminal trial proceedings, Monique was recognized for her knowledge, expertise and understanding of all aspects of pre-trial, trial, and post-trial military justice matters.

Monique is a member of the Texas state bar, is Article 27(b) certified for all military courts, and is admitted to practice in front of the Navy-Marine Court of Criminal Appeals, the Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces, the U.S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, and the U.S. Supreme Court.