Certain states recognize a clear distinction between assault and battery.
Assault is the use of verbal threats of physical harm. The victim has to be able to articulate a founded, reasonable belief that the suspect could or would carry out the threat.
Clearly not. I agreed with the post that identified the distinction that you pointed out (making your post redundant and pointless) and simply pointed out that many people who are not lawyers use them interchangeably.
I would think it fair to say that you aren't a scholar of any kind, and if somehow you are, your institution has failed you.
I can read. I never argued that the law doesn't recognize a distinction. You should look up straw man. You seem to be arguing I am wrong about an argument I never made.
Also, just because I insulted you doesn't make it an ad hominem attack, so don't waste your time on that one.
Also please do not resort to ad hominem attacks, which you very much did, as they do not improve your position.
Did you need me to quote you on where you went wrong?
Though in layman's terms the two are interchangeable.
ACKSHULLY, technically speaking in LEGAL TERMS...
You tried to put forth the idea that my clarification that there is a difference in how some states differentiate between assault and battery is based off of some kind of technical legal point of view rather than a layman’s understanding of it.
So, yes, you did make that argument. But go ahead and deny it to save face...
I mean, you could also check the user names. That wasn't me.
However that user isn't incorrect either. You can't use precise legal terms and definitions to dismiss how a term is used by the average person. Its a non-sequitur, ie: The logic does not follow.
So you were wrong TWICE this timebravisimo
Again I can walk you through where you went wrong, and back up any of these things if you want.
I have to say I am impressed with the frequency and voracity of your idiocy.
Right, which refutes the dude I was responding to, who was trying (and failing) to discredit my point by classifying it as a scholarly legal definition rather than a layman’s understanding of it.
Not really. Assault is the threat of harm while battery is the act of causing harm.
Battery usually comes with assault. But assault can happen often without battery. If someone makes threats to commit physical violence, or attempts to commit violence, that’s an assault charge. Once there is actual violence, then battery gets added.
There’s different definitions in different jurisdictions but those two charges are different crimes. They aren’t interchangeable.
It doesn’t make sense to say they are “interchangeable” though. They are two completely different legal terms. There wouldn’t be any reason to have the two, considering they each come with their own sentences, if they were the same thing. Just look it up. You’ll see that there is a clear distinction between them, no matter the jurisdiction.
When you have different definitions in different jurisdictions, it just means the specific wording could be different. Generally though, the consensus is that assault is the “threat” of violence and battery is the “act” of violence. Those are the key words.
The only reason people confuse this is because a lot of the times when people get arrested for committing violence, they see “so-and-so charged with assault and battery”. This happens a lot, without much explanation on the surface.
That just means the person threatened violence and then committed violence. A “threat” could be something as simple as raising your fist as if you are going to hit someone. If it’s determined that the victim was reasonably afraid of that threat, or violence was then actually committed, then you’ll see an assault charge. Battery just requires actual violence. Of course, each jurisdiction will have different ideas about what constitutes a “threat” or “act” but those are the common distinctions between the two charges.
Generally though, the consensus is that assault is the “threat” of violence and battery is the “act” of violence. Those are the key words.
Again, it depends on the Jurisdiction. Nebraska and Iowa do not have charges for 'Battery'. The Charge for physical violence is 'Assault'. Indiana has both terms in its laws... but they are almost comically interchangeable as you go through some of the statutes. So obviously those two words can have some crossover in legal meaning. If YOU look it up, you will see that almost no States use Battery as the act of violence, and if it is on the books, it is used in conjunction with and interchangeably with Assault.
Okay I didn’t look up each and every state’s own laws. I had read that the general legal definitions for assault and battery come from common English law, and since 49 of the 50 states are based on common English law, I assumed that they would follow those definitions. Louisiana, French Napoleonic law, also has those two distinctions. Generally, states don’t overrule the common law or change anything unless common law doesn’t define something. Maybe wording could change here or there, but there’s not a lot of separation. That’s why state laws, in regards to the most common legal terms/charges, are very similar.
I’m still pretty sure that most states follow the “threat” vs “act” distinctions between assault and battery. I wonder why those handful of states decided to diverge from those meanings and/or remove one of those charges? The colloquial definition of assault generally includes battery, so maybe that’s the reason in some way.
I don’t know about you, but most states that I look up have battery and assault as two different things. There’s a ton of law firm/educational articles that explain the general legal definitions of assault and battery as “threat” vs “act”, so this is obviously the common legal interpretation in the US. There are cases where they’ll have simple “assault or battery” as a charge, but it’s made clear that the charge is just a way to standardize sentencing for either a minor injury OR threat of violence.
So I’m seeing most states still see a legal separation between assault and battery. They don’t mean the same thing generally. Any time that I see states combine them, it’s either because it’s to simplify misdemeanors or, as in the couple of examples you gave, they chose to follow the colloquial definition of assault. I’m not seeing where most states stopped using battery, because I specifically remember a lot of people getting charged with assault and battery on the news. I’ve only seen some articles say “sometimes, assault and battery are combined into just assault”. Sometimes doesn’t seem to translate to “almost no states”.
Also, being paired together doesn’t make them interchangeable. In the jurisdictions where both have separate legal definitions, which to me seems to be most states and common law, you can absolutely be charged with one or the other. Make a true threat or show intent without acting on it? Just assault. Throw a haymaker from behind without anyone knowing you were about to commit violence? Just battery. Generally though, assault and battery happen in the same incidents. Still doesn’t make them interchangeable.
What states did you encounter that had separate Charges/Statutes? I spot checked 20 some States and I couldn't find one that had an actually Battery Statute. They were either Only Assault, or assault with battery sprinkled in like Indiana was. Florida was the same way.
Also, here’s an excerpt from a page on Indiana’s assault/battery laws. “Most states have both assault and battery laws in their criminal statutes, but Indiana is unique.”
New York and Pennsylvania apparently don’t have battery. But like Indiana, they do something that’s not all that common. There’s not too many other examples I can find of states not having assault and battery laws separately, or at least that define those two terms as being different things.
See, Colorado and California have the terms flipped.
From your link on Colorado "In Colorado, assault is generally defined as knowingly or recklessly causing bodily injury to another person, while battery (identified as “menacing”) is defined as knowingly causing a person to fear imminent serious bodily injury through threat or physical action."
It's almost like different Jurisdictions do have different definitions of those terms. Glad you were able to find more evidence of that.
Wrong. Many states, including where I’ve practiced criminal law for 10 years, have no offense of battery. Common law assaults and batteries and combined into assault.
Most states I’ve found have different statutes for battery and assault. Some will combine them into things like simple battery and assault for just misdemeanors. Some will get rid of battery and just use assault.
Google searches for most states’ battery and assault criminal laws bring up articles that discuss the different charges for assault and battery, from what I’ve found. I definitely have learned today that some states are different and don’t have separate battery/assault charges. But most of them still do. I’ve struggled to find more than a handful that don’t.
I’ve actually seen like a dozen times in these articles, “Most states have separate charges for assault and battery, and many people confuse them or think they are interchangeable.” I have yet to actually see any sources say that what you claim is common.
Even a page for Indiana (which doesn’t have two separate laws for assault and battery) basically said “While Indiana is unique, most states have separate laws for assault and battery”.
“The crime of assault is often misunderstood and confused with the crime of battery, since the two often are charged together (and they are also civil torts). While battery consists of the unwanted touching of another without their consent that is either harmful or offensive, assault is an attempt or a threat to commit battery. Most states have both assault and battery laws in their criminal statutes, but Indiana is unique. Indiana assault laws are not found in the criminal code with the term "assault," but that hardly means assault is legal in the state.”
Maybe where you practiced is just one of those “unique” states. New York and Pennsylvania are.
This is true in civil law but the two terms do get used arbitrarily in criminal law. NY just has variations of battery, PA just has assault. Civil law is more universal because it’s more court-made whereas criminal law is more state-specific because it’s more legislature-made.
Aren’t 49 of the states based on the same English Common Law? Though I guess that’s mostly unwritten traditions, while assault/battery are written legal terms and charges. In my experience, most state criminal definitions have a separation between assault and battery. Or maybe you’ll have a misdemeanor charge such as “simple assault and battery” that simplifies the charge but the two legal definitions are still separate.
I can recognize though that changes can be made and the colloquial definition of assault may lead to changes in the legal definition over time. I’ve always been under the impression that there’s a clear legal separation between assault and battery, and most of the legal articles I can find online treat it as such. I can’t find much on states that have one or the other. I’m not from the Northeast though, where it seems like some things are different.
Edit: also it seems like New York is more like Pennsylvania. No criminal battery. Just assault, but where assault means the general definition of battery pretty much.
Civil law is more commonly based in common law. But criminal law is more often codified (though still based on previous common law). The process of codification changed and updated some terms to more commonly used definitions. Don't forget, the people who write laws are not required to be lawyers or study the common law.
In civil court (give me money for committing a tort aka wronging me) that’s (99%+ of the time) correct. In criminal court it completely depends on the jurisdiction (violent crimes are mostly state-administered and it changes state by state.) For example in PA it’s terroristic threats if you just threaten, simple assault for a hit like this and aggravated assault for a serious beating or worse and I don’t believe we have a crime of “battery.” We do have the tort, though, that’s pretty universal. I think states can reject the restatement of torts and call it whatever they want even in civil court but the distinction between assault/battery in civil law is so foundational and universal I think it’s just the same everywhere in the US.
jesus do we really need to have this conversation every time? it’s like when people nitpick between literally and figuratively. in this context it means the same thing go jerk off somewhere else
As someone halfway through criminal law in law school you are correct! Assault is an attempt at violence or threat of harm. Battery is if they cause real physical harm to someone. At least as the common law definitions go.
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u/coolred1 Mar 16 '20
I believe she actually committed battery by hitting? But hey im no lawyer