Mayor Daisuke Hanashiro, left, and Maj. Gen. Brian Wolford, commander of Marine Corps Installations Pacific, take part in a joint patrol of Gate 2 Street in Okinawa city, Okinawa, April 18, 2025. (Keishi Koja/Stars and Stripes)

CAMP FOSTER, Okinawa — Nine Marines may face charges under the military justice system after encountering a joint patrol in Okinawa city, the latest sign that the military is cracking down on off-duty misconduct.

About 50 U.S. and Japanese civil and military authorities took part in the patrol near Gate 2 Street, a nightlife district outside Kadena Air Base, from midnight to 2 a.m. Saturday, a spokesman for Okinawa city’s Base Policy Division said by phone Monday. Some Japanese government officials speak to the press only on condition of anonymity.

Military police took the Marines into custody during the patrol and released them later that morning to their commands, which will determine possible charges, Marine Corps Installations Pacific spokeswoman 1st Lt. Kelsey Enlow said by phone Wednesday.

The detentions represent a step up in enforcing liberty rules imposed after a spate of sexual assault cases surfaced on the island, the installations commander said this week.

“As you do everything through operations, you slowly ramp up in the context of those operations, and over the last several months it’s been kind of an education process,” Maj. Gen. Brian Wolford told reporters Monday during a roundtable at Camp Foster. “Now over the last weekend we have transitioned to enforcement of those regulations.”

The patrol included 20 law enforcement officers from base Provost Marshal’s Offices, 12 of them Marines, who continued until about 5 a.m., Enlow said. Local and prefectural police and representatives of the Okinawa Defense Bureau, an army of Japan’s Ministry of Defense, made up the rest.

Maj. Gen. Brian Wolford, commander of Marine Corps Installations Pacific, speaks with reporters at Ocean Breeze on Camp Foster, Okinawa, Aug. 18, 2025. (Ryan M. Breeden/Stars and Stripes)

Three Marines were fingerprinted and entered into the provost marshal database for “alleged violations of the Uniform Code of Military Justice,” Enlow said by phone Wednesday, without elaborating. The other six “either refused to provide a valid ID, became aggressive, or tried to flee the area,” she wrote in an email Monday.

One Marine who was shouting and acting aggressively was held down by police and later taken to Naval Hospital Okinawa, the Ryukyu Shimpo newspaper reported Tuesday, citing unnamed officials. Enlow and Okinawa Prefectural Police declined to confirm or deny the report.

All nine Marines were held at the Provost Marshal’s Office on Foster before being released to unit representatives later Saturday morning, Enlow said.

“Each command has expressed their desire for fast and aggressive adjudication,” she said.

Joint patrols began April 18 in response to a series of sexual assault allegations against U.S. service members over the past couple of years.

Senior Airman Brennon Washington was convicted last year of kidnapping and sexually assaulting a minor in December 2023. Marine Lance Cpl. Jamel Clayton was convicted in June of strangling and attempting to sexually assault a woman in May 2024. Both cases are under appeal. Two other cases are still pending.

No one was detained during the first three joint patrols, Marine Corps Installations Command spokesman Maj. Brett Dornhege-Lazaroff said in July.

On Saturday, law enforcement officers stopped at least 25 service members for violating liberty rules, which were modified by U.S. Forces Japan in September to prohibit troops from being in a drinking establishment or consuming alcohol publicly after 1 a.m. Military police photographed their IDs and reminded them of the policy, Enlow said.

Wolford said during Monday’s roundtable that the Marine Corps is working to expand the patrols to Okinawa’s capital, Naha, and is in discussions with local police and Mayor Satoru Chinen, though no date has been set.

He said he does not foresee patrol escalating to further levels of enforcement.

“We’ve been doing education, getting exposure out there in the towns and villages up to this point,” Wolford said. “I think we’re at the level we need to be at with the joint patrols, so I don’t see it escalating, because the word is getting out … I do not see it escalating; I see it staying constant.”