If you or a loved one has been charged with Domestic Violence you should seek legal counsel as soon as possible. As a former probation officer, deputy distict attorney with more than 14 years of experience, I can help you through this.
I have handled hundreds of domestic violence cases in Fresno including Felony and Misdemeanor cases.
You need experienced counsel. I have that experience to help you if after reading this article you still have questions give us a call at 559 441-1418.
COMMON DEFENSES TO DOMESTIC VIOLENCE
1. False Accusation
Many times we have cases where the accusation was proven to be either false or completely taken out of context with no physical evidence to back up the story. Believe it or not these cases are often taken to trial.
2. Insufficient evidence
There could be insufficient evidence to conivict you. This could be lack of Injury, no visible injuries, no inedpendent witnesses, no 911 call,
3. Lack of cooperation from the alleged victim. Now there is a lot of misunderstanding about this. First, the myth that an alleged victim can drop charges against the person they made the claim against. This is not the case. The District Attorney and only the District Attorney will decide if they will drop the charges with an uncooperative victim. Sometimes there will be enough evidence wihtout his or her testimony to go forward with the case. Such as body cam evidence, witnesses, visible injuries, past domestic violence disputes that fit a pattern etc.
4. Self Defense many times a person can be defending themselves and get charged with domestic violence. We have even seen cases where the person had defensive wounds a story that was corroborated and is still charged with domestic violence. If you were defending yourself from attack you could be charged with domestic violence even though you were defending yourself.
There are many other defenses to domestic violence that we could go through here and have gone through in seperate blogs. The main thing is that you get an Attorney right away. Waiting and letting the supposed evidence pile up with a one sided story is never a good idea. Defenses sometimes get worse as they go along due to witnesses taking off a one sided story being presented to the prosecution etc.
Sometimes even before charges are filed we have had success with getting favorable evidence to the prosecution through statements and physical evidence such as pictures etc. and other evidence that is so overwhelming the prosecution does not file charges.
The way a cases usually works is that the police arrest and investigate and then give the results of that investigation over the District Attorneys office. The District Attorneys office makes a choice regarding whether or not to file charges and what charges will be filed. This depends on a lot of different factors. Sometimes a Warrant can be issued for your arrest by passing the prosecutors office completely. This is when the Detectives go to a Judge and ask him to sign a warrant for someones arrest based upon propable cause. However, it is still the prosecutors job to prosecute or not to prosecute. This part cannot be bypassed. Sometimes you can convince a prosector not to go forward with a case even if a warrant has been filed for your arrest. This is another reason you should seek legal counsel right away. Many times your choices and options are limited the further you have gone in the court process. The more the prosecution has invested in the case the more difficult it will be for them to simply drop charges. So if you have been accused or arrested of domestic violence give us a call.
