What to Know Before Consulting an Assault Lawyer

One of the most well recognized offenses happen to be assault and battery, which often run hand in hand. Nevertheless, the two offenses are actually two distinct criminal or civil acts that may end up being charged as misdemeanors or felonies. They are often mistakenly lumped together with other lawsuit-worthy cases, such as  negligence (which you will need to hire negligence attorney law firms for, not assault firms).

Assault

Assault is synonymous with illegal attack brought on by one person upon another, and it is regarded as a felony if your assailant makes use of a weapon in the process. It isn’t necessary that the assailant hurt another person for a court to take into account the attempt at breach of the law. Simply because utilizing a gun, knife, or even another weapon might most likely lead to severe injuries if the criminal offense were effectively completed, law enforcement treat this particular offense very seriously.

Battery

Battery, in comparison, requires physically injuring someone else. Jointly, assault and battery happen at the felony levels whenever a individual willfully or along with intent to bring about serious bodily harm, injuries, or hurts, beats, or otherwise harms another person. In contrast to simple assault and battery, felony assault and battery leads to substantial injuries or harm to the person or is focused against an elderly individual or a child. Additionally, one of the most major assault and battery felonies is the one with a sexual nature, that causes the criminal to enroll as a sex offender right after completing his / her jail sentence.

Felony Assault and Battery Penalties

Since felony assault and battery usually run hand in hand, they’re usually sentenced in concert as well. A few of the possible penalties for felony assault and battery will most certainly be:

  • Jail time
  • Probation
  • Parole
  • Anger management courses
  • Sacrificing the right to own a firearm

First Time Offenses

Just like any violent criminal offense, sentencing with felony assault and battery is commonly extremely strict in many states. Especially for first offenses, prison time and/or substantial probation time along with reporting and contact with a probation official can be common. The objective here is to send a message to the perpetrator. Additionally, legal courts almost always look at 2nd offenses as felonies because these types of offenses frequently result in substantial bodily harm and psychological duress to the victim.

Use The Best Lawyer

An effective assault lawyer can work using the courts in order to possibly reduce the actual charges to a misdemeanor within some situations, particularly if she or he may show key elements such as self-defense or prior threats from the other person involved. Whenever dealing with any kind of felony charges, it is important to keep in mind that having such charges in your record may adversely effect your future as well as result in termination from current occupation. Paying out the extra money for a good assault lawyer will help with getting a reduced sentence. Opposing assault and battery charges, particularly if you can find mitigating circumstances present, may be the smartest choice for a feasible reduced sentence or acquittal.

Will My Assault Case Succeed?

When you were assaulted, the first thing you thought of wasn’t to run to a lawyer and initiate legal proceedings against the culprit. In fact you were probably afraid and were wondering if you were going seriously injured. Now that it is over you are wondering if there is anything that you can do to the person who assaulted you. You might even be considering hiring an assault lawyer to help you get what you deserve. There are many factors that are considered by attorneys in order to determine the success of the case.

First, in order to determine if there is a case you must know what an assault is. Every state defines an assault differently, but most describe it as an unlawful unwanted intentional touching. Objects or weapons are considered part of the body of the attacker. Some states also define this as a battery. Regardless of what your state calls it, there must have an unwanted touching at a bare minimum. In dealing with the specific definition of your state, you should consult with an assault lawyer.

There are two kind of cases that can be filed with an assault. Criminal charges could be filed and a civil lawsuit can be filed. Criminal charges, such as those that criminal tax attorneys defend,  are filed by the prosecutor in order to possibly get a criminal conviction against the person who assaulted you. On the other hand, your attorney would file a civil lawsuit and determine if it is likely to succeed.

Finally, the attorney you hire to help with your assault case will want to know one more thing if there appears the case might succeed. How much money does the alleged assailant have. There is no sense in filing an assault case against the homeless guy that attacked you at the bus stop. There is no chance of collecting money. However, your assault lawyer might be able to figure out if somebody with deep pockets should be responsible for the attack. Perhaps the city or bus company. There must be some causal or proximate relationship between the party being sued and the fact that the homeless guy attacked you.