Falsely accused of corporal injury on a spouse or cohabitant? Advice from a former D.A.

Peno code section 273.5 is the primary California law defining domestic violence and it's sometimes called spousal battery corporal injury on a spouse spousal abuse and basically it applies in situations where you inflict some sort of bodily injury on a current or former spouse cohabitant or the parent of your child so basically if the alleged victim is someone that you're dating uh but you've never lived with and don't uh and and were never married to and don't have any children with then it doesn't apply so it's current or former spouse cohabitant or the parent of your child a an infliction of bodily injury means that there's some sort of visible verifiable injury now now that could be a very serious injury like a broken bone or a contusion or a black eye sometimes it can be a relatively minor injury like simply a red mark or a scratch or a welt when police respond to a domestic violence call they will always take photographs of any injuries that they observe and they send these photographs to the district attorney's office along with the report and the da considers this in deciding what charges to file and if the case ever goes to court and goes to trial the da will present these these pictures to a jury to try to prove the crime now Peno code section 273.5 is a wobbler that means it could be filed as either a misdemeanor or a felony depending on the circumstances and as a felony it can carry up to four years in state prison and sometimes more if there's a real serious injury involved if you're convicted of domestic violence under 273.5 in addition to probation and jail and and impossible prison you'll have to do a 52- we domestic violence class where where you go once a week for a year and perhaps the worst repercussion of a domestic violence conviction is having it on your permanent record because an employer when they do a background check sees a domestic violence conviction it really is a red flag because the employer will think uh is this person violent are they temperamental are they dangerous are they liability to have here in the workplace and and as hard as it is in this economy to get a job at all if you have the on your record it it can be exponentially harder so to the extent that you got arrested for domestic violence and you're facing the charge you want to do everything that you can now to keep it off your record to to fight your case and beat your case a and that's where we come in the the good news is here at sh's Law Group we've had a great record of success over the years in fighting these cases and getting domestic violence charges reduced or dismissed and we find that uh domestic violence is one of those crimes where lots of innocent people get wrongly accused and that happens for a number of reasons first of all we find a lot of times our client acted in righteous self-defense so maybe our client did uh inflict some sort of injury minor injury on on his his wife for example but she came at him and was was punching him and wailing on him and and he was literally trying to get her away and protect himself a and and he has an absolute right to defend himself in that situation also we find a lot of times that the injury occurred as a result of an accident so there was a heated argument and there was some shoving going on and and some arms flailing around and you know somebody fell uh somebody got hit but but it really wasn't a situation where our client was trying to to strike the other person but it occurred as a result of an accident and we also see a lot of situations where literally a a person will inflict injuries on themselves and point the finger at the other person a lot of these cases arise in a very volatile time in a relationship where a couple is about to break up they're about to move out they're about to get a divorce and one side wants to get the upper hand in child custody or divorce proceedings or or one side is very angry and bitter and wants to get the other person so they make up false accusations and then they put together false evidence uh in order to get the other person arrested in order to get the other person in trouble and unfortunately when the cops respond to a domestic violence call they tend to do a very poor investigation they tend to rush to judgment they tend to either automatically arrest the man or or to assume that the person who called the police must be the victim uh when in reality the story may be much more complicated when in reality the person who they brand as the victim may have been the aggressor who started it uh and really the wrong person gets arrested we see that all the time and and here at sha Law Group we have a team of former prosecutors former police officers who used to investigate and prosecute domestic violence cases and now of course our job is to defend people in this situation if you've been arrested if you've been charged if you have a pending case we implore you don't go to court and simply plead guilty and take the consequences of this come and talk to us sit down tell us the whole story we may be able to go to court and present your side of it and ultimately get your charges reduced or dismissed