hi my name is jamal kersey and i'm a criminal defense attorney in san diego california and in this video i'll be discussing the charge of corporal injury to a spouse california penal code section 273.5 makes it illegal to injure a spouse cohabitant or co-parent to prove a defendant is guilty of violating this section a prosecutor must prove the following elements number one the defendant intentionally and unlawfully inflicted a physical injury on his or her current or former spouse cohabitant or the child's parent and number two the injury resulted in a traumatic condition and number three the defendant did not act in self-defense let's look at a real world example a man and his wife get into an argument about him looking at another woman talking turns into yelling the man angry about the confrontation punches his wife in the face the wife calls 9-1-1 the police arrive they notice her nose is bleeding and her face is swollen the man could be arrested and charged with corporal injury to a spouse based on having hit his wife in the attack causing a traumatic condition a twist on the previous example would be the man pushing his wife instead of punching her the wife in fear for her safety calls 9-1-1 when the police arrive she tells them her husband pushed her into the couch but she wasn't exactly hurt in this situation corporal injury to a spouse would not likely apply due to the lack of injury under these facts the man could still be charged with domestic battery though as mentioned before in order to be found guilty of violating section 273.5 the defendant cannot have been acting in self-defense this is because a person has the right to defend themselves from an immediate threat of harm so if the defendant was acting in self-defense then they cannot be found guilty of violating 273.5 one of the most common defenses in domestic violence cases is that the other party lied in their statement to the police there can be a number of motivations for this such as seeking revenge getting the upper hand in child custody disputes or just wanting to scare the other person corporal injury to a spouse can be prosecuted as either a felony or a misdemeanor this decision is usually based on the type of force used the injury the defendant's criminal history and other mitigating or aggravating circumstances if charged as a felony a defendant can be sentenced to up to four years in prison with another possible five years if great bodily injury has been inflicted and have a possible strike on their record as a misdemeanor the maximum sentence would be one year in county jail so there you have a brief overview of the charge of corporal injury to a spouse if you found this video useful please show me some love and hit the like button if you haven't already make sure you subscribe to the channel turn on notifications so you never miss a new video when it drops as always i want to thank you so much for watching till next time peace you