Protecting Your Rights And Your Future

The facts regarding assault charges may provide a defense

| Jan 19, 2016 | Violent Crimes

Charges of criminal assault and aggravated assault in Arkansas are based on fact specific events that must be supported by credible evidence. There may be altercations that point to two or more people being involved in fighting, but the police may decide to arrest only one of the individuals due to an ‘official’ version of the facts that they accept as a basis for their case against the defendant. Thus, the possibility that the police have adopted an erroneous set of facts may leave ample room for defense counsel to investigate and establish a range of issues and facts that may exonerate the defendant or result in mitigating circumstances. Recently in Little Rock the police arrested a 37-year-old apartment manager for aggravated assault, second-degree domestic battery and residential burglary.

According to police reports, a female resident of the apartment building reported to police that the building manager used her key to enter the female resident’s apartment. While inside, she stabbed a man identified as the manager’s boyfriend with a knife during a confrontation. There was a laceration on the man’s arm that required several staples to close, according to the police.

Apparently, the man stabbed was the manager’s boyfriend or former boyfriend. Criminal defense counsel’s first task will be to cut through the prejudicial images to see what really occurred. There can be many different factual colorations that appear with respect to the reported version provided by the authorities.

For example, was the manager  authorized to enter the apartment for social as well as business purposes? Was she a friend of the female resident? How did she know that her boyfriend was in the apartment? What abuse or assault did she possibly suffer at the victim’s hands that day?  These questions are really just the beginning of the kind of detailed inquiry that must be made to determine whether the complete facts may favor the defendant. Under Arkansas law, a more complete picture of the facts may provide justification or a defense for the defendant with reference to one or more of the charges.

Source: arkansasonline.com, “Police beat“, Scott Carroll, Jan. 16, 2016

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