Washington, DC - A civilian employee working for the U.S. Marine Corps Community Association pleaded guilty to assaulting his spouse while working in Iwakuni, Japan.

Nicholas L. McQuaid, Acting Assistant Attorney General of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division; Matthew Schneider, U.S Attorney for the Eastern District of Michigan;  and Timothy Mahew, Special Agent in Charge of the Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) Far East Field Office made the announcement. 

Jason Beltran, 35, a former U.S. Marine most recently residing in Flushing, Michigan, pleaded guilty to a single count of assault of a spouse resulting in substantial bodily injury. Beltran entered his plea before U.S. District Judge Nancy G. Edmunds in the U.S. District Court in Detroit, Michigan.

According to the admissions made in connection with his plea, Beltran was an active duty U.S. Marine stationed in Iwakuni, until he was honorably discharged from the Marine Corps in 2011. 

Thereafter, Beltran was hired by the U.S. Marine Corps Community Services to work as a library technician at Marine Corps Air Station Iwakuni. In 2011, Beltran married a dual Japanese-U.S. citizen and had three children with his spouse. Beltran admitted that on or about June 20, 2017, he had an argument with his spouse during which he punched her with a closed fist to the side of her face causing a gash that required several stitches to close the wound, and which resulted in a small, permanent scar.

Sentencing is scheduled for May 3.  

NCIS conducted the investigation. Trial Attorneys Frank G. Rangoussis and John-Alex Romano of the Criminal Division’s Human Rights and Special Prosecutions Section are prosecuting the case.