False Assault Reported By Neighbors - Please Advise

[chris90]

Here is a brief summary of our situation.

Incident:

Me and my partner had a petty quarrel in the car park of our apartment complex.

Evidence:

Someone reported to the police that I assaulted her filming last 40 seconds when I was shouting and trying to pull her out of the car.

Incident Details:

My partner started the quarrel inside the flat obstructing me from going out. Chased me to the car park pulled me, resisted me not to get into the car, and when I pulled myself away and got into the car, she rushed into the passenger seat and we had a long quarrel inside the car where I was resisting her and requesting her to go back. After 10-15 min I got out of the car, rushed to the passenger side, opened the door, shouted at her and tried to pulled her out of the car, she came out and then I left. Unfortunately there is no evidence or CCTV there of the first 15min of the incident and someone only filmed the last 40 seconds.

Next 3 hours:

I came back in about 2 hours and we forgot that incident there itself and we were living our life normally. During this time I checked on her through my son and he said she was ok.

Suddenly the police barged into our house and without listening to my partner though she said everything was ok, they arrested me and took to custody citing that they have evidence, processed me and charged me with Active Bodily Harm. Later they reduced to Common Assault.

WHAT OPTIONS DO WE HAVE NOW?

Please advise what can we do to stop all this. My partner is ready to do anything needed and requested the police officer several times to dismiss charges but they are not listening

WHAT OPTIONS DO WE HAVE NOW?

Before it goes to CPS,  we are thinking of these options. 
1. Can my partner raise a written request with Police?
2. Can I raise a written request with Police at this stage?
3. Can my partner go and talks in person to the investigating officer. What is best and what should we request?

What is the procedure for any of these. 

[bednobs]

i am not a law person.  

probably none of the above are an option (or you could do them but thyll mak no difference)

[Peter Pedant]

Ring up a lawyer - I think the die is already case

[Ringlet]

I am not a qualified lawyer, but I do know that, if there is evidence,  police can bring charges of assault against an individual, even when the "victim" of the assault does not want the charges to stand.  

It seems from what you say that the police do have evidence against you, independently of anything the "victim" says, so if the police decide to prosecute you, I think there is little you can do to prevent that happening. 

You need to hire a good lawyer.  

[chris90]

Thanks for quick responses.

Yes, we spoke to couple of solicitors.

One said there is no case here as the presumed victim herself says nothing has happened and the evidence will be insufficient when she explains the whole incident herself.  They did say that we are happy to take this up and charge you 7500 but you really don't need to do anything.

Other said they would represent me till this goes to CPS to try get the evidence and write a letter of representation to police before it goes to CPS. They quoted 2500 for this and suggested if it for some reason goes to court, that will be a different discussion.

We are really worried of these numbers and unwanted trouble we are in now. 

We are planning to meet the police office in person and hand over a written statement by my partner explaining the full incident and requesting him to consider dropping the case. But we are not sure of

1. How to approach this

2. What is the format should be - Whom to address, what to write/not-write in that letter so we don't write something silly that may do more harm than good to our situation.

3. If he doesn't want to meet or entertain us to handover this letter to him, whom do we submit this and what is the official process of submitting such a letter before it goes to CPS.

We want to submit such a letter for sure as there is no official statement from my partner that is recorded in this case yet. It has been her verbal requests to police to stop all this. We are hoping that such a letter will serve as an evidence and request from my partner to help CPS decide not to progress and drop the charges.
 

Please advise if anyone can help with the 3 points above.

[ASH55]

A guy has written a book about how you should never ever speak to a policeman because by doing so you create a - or another - witness against you. It used to be the case that a woman had to press charges and if she refused to press charges, the police had to drop the case. Sounds like you need to put in a police complaint and it may be better if your partner does it and tells them what happened and that it's totally ridiculous to say it was abuse. Be as assertive, level-headed and polite - as if you were being recorded they would not have anything against you - as you can as sometimes authorities walk all over people just because they can. 

[Canary42]

Sadlly, all to often statement withdrawals are made under duress, which is why the Police and the CPS tend to ignore them if there is other evidence. Best of luck in your efforts to avoid prosecution. 

[jno]

the police are wary of complainants refusing to give evidence, fearing (with some justice) that abusive partners have forced them to do so. This doesn't directly apply in your case as your partner didn't lay a complaint in the first place.

Still, like it or not it was an assault, and there's partial visual evidence, so the two of you will have to talk your way out of it somehow. You can try persuading the police, reminding them that the case was made by a busybody with a camera rather than by either of you, and that 40 seconds will never show the truth of what happened; but ultimately you may have to convince a court that you behave like this all the time and that neither of you has ever caused the other the slightest harm.

I'd be inclined to do it myself and save the lawyer's fees, but over to you.

[New Judge]

“It used to be the case that a woman had to press charges and if she refused to press charges, the police had to drop the case.”

I don’t know that it was ever invariably the case. But they were far more reluctant some years ago to proceed with a prosecution if the alleged victim did not support it. Things are different today. Particularly with domestic violence allegations (which this is) the CPS has a policy of prosecuting provided there is sufficient evidence, even without the victim’s support.

The problem you have is that from your description of events, you are guilty:

“After 10-15 min I got out of the car, rushed to the passenger side, opened the door, shouted at her and tried to pulled her out of the car, she came out and then I left”

What went before may mitigate the offence, but it will not provide you with a defence. I believe a court will view leaving a car, going to the passenger side and trying to pull your partner from her seat as a deliberate assault. There seems no question of self-defence; you were under no threat at the time. As well as that you had the chance to “take a breath” as you went round the car.

I don’t really see any of your suggestions getting anywhere. The decision to charge you was almost certainly taken by the CPS rather than the police and is thus out of police hands. The CPS are very reluctant to discontinue matters upon a request from the victim of domestic violence. The very reason they continue even without the victim’s support is that a big problem with DV matters is that the victim often faces coercion to withdraw the allegation.

The proposed fees from the solicitors are ridiculous and, again from your description, I doubt they will be able to secure your acquittal. You will be able to take advantage of the duty solicitor scheme if you do appear in court. You will be entitled to a consultation before you go into court and the duty brief should represent you on your first appearance in court. I would be surprised if you were advised to do anything other than plead guilty, though your mitigation could help reduce your sentence to a minimum.

[Peter Pedant]

thx NJ

It is quite difficult to say to someone - you did it and now you have to pay

[chris90]

Thanks again for all your replies. All give different valid perspectives. 

One question based on @New Judge comments 

"I don’t really see any of your suggestions getting anywhere. The decision to charge you was almost certainly taken by the CPS rather than the police and is thus out of police hands."

Does this mean, the case is already with CPS? Our understanding was the police arrest, does the investigation and submit the report to CPS after a lot of time. We were hoping to appeal to police with this letter as we think the case still not submitted to CPS. When they do it, we will be informed and we should go and meet them. Is this understanding totally wrong.

Please advise what exactly might have happened till now and what will happen from here. When does CPS get involved.

[New Judge]

"Does this mean, the case is already with CPS? Our understanding was the police arrest, does the investigation and submit the report to CPS after a lot of time."

I was going on the fact that you said you had been charged with Common Assault (reduced from ABH).

It varies across police forces but I would think for a DV incident the charging decision would be made by the CPS. I really couldn't say what has happened up to now - you would know better than I.

Personally I would not pin your hopes on being able to influence any decision the police or CPS might take. This is particularly so with DV matters because, whilst I'm not saying for one minute it applies in your case, they are acutely aware that coercion (to minimise the seriousness of the event or refuse to support a prosecution) is highly prevalent in such cases. Although there are some exceptions, generally a person cannot give their consent to being assaulted (and from your description there was no question of that anyway) and it follows that they cannot excuse an assault after it has taken place. 

If the charging decision has not yet been made I'm still of the opinion that any representations either of you make are unlikely to influence it. 

[chris90]

Thanks for quick reply. 

The current status from what the officer said - He is taking time to submit his report to CPS and will inform us when that happens. 

My partner's genuine concerns here are

1. How did they decide I assaulted her when she never felt threatened or I behaved in a way to harm her in this whole episode or ever before

2. She didn't even raise a complaint and she is independent enough to not tolerate anyone if someone threatens let alone assaults her.

3. Due to somone's misunderstanding and misrepresentation of facts with partial evidence, this is heading towards a criminal record for the rest of my life that will impact her and my children. 

4. How is this doing justice if everyone is punished including the presumed victim when she is herself cried out she is not.

Our understanding is that the lowest charge is a warning/caution and that will stay in my records for the rest of my life for jobs and immigration among many other checks everywhere.

[barry1010]

chris, all of those questions have already been answered.

A victim of assault does not have to make a complaint to the police.  If there is evidence of assault that is enough unless there is a plausible reason to counteract it.

I will repeat this is because victims of assault might refuse to make a complaint or withdraw a statement because they are frightened of the assailant, have been co-erced or threatened, or don't want them to get a criminal record out of a sense of misguided loyalty. 

Even when the victim consents to the assault, or has asked to be assaulted, there can be a prosecution (yes, it has happened and more times than you might think)

[chris90]

Thanks Barry. Understood. 😟

Not sure what to say.

Probably we wanted to mean this way below..

Can the previous 15min of the incident where two partners quarrelled, where my partner chased me to the car, she even held me by neck and shouted at me which provoked me to the last 30-40 secs ignores the whole context and brands this as my assault 😞

Or just because there is no evidence of all that, should we simply bear the brunt based on the available evidence OR can her statement of evidence as a primary witness will help counteract this partial evidence. 

We probably wanted to see if these can be considered as "a plausible reason to counteract it"  as you rightly put it.

[bednobs]

i would have thought the last thing you want to do is highlight the fact she assaulted you too!

then she would be in the position you are in now as well

[barry1010]

I wouldn't be surprised if the CPS make the decision to drop the case.  All you can do is wait and see

[chris90]

Bednobs! I wouldn't want that to happen to my partner, no matter what.

Yes Barry! That's our hope. But the whole point of the disccussion is that the CPS or Police have no statement from my partner that explains the whole episode for them to consider in any way. So, wondering if it will aid that hope.

 

[chris90]

Hi.. Just a sad update on this. The prosecution has charged me that I have beaten my partner slapping and hitting her on the dashboard which is not the true. The video evidence was zoomed in which was not clear but showing my partner moving her down. She submitted a letter explaining the situation and I submitted a personal statement apologizing for my behavior requesting for consideration and the solicitor sent a representation. But they didn't want to budge and gave me a court date to attend.

Please could you advise on two points

1. Is it worth for me and my partner to explain one last time to the CPS email id provided that the video is very misleading and I never hit her. 

2. If I eventually have to go to court, should I have to plead guilty for what they claim in the charges that I hit her which I haven't done. The solicitor advises to plead guilty as the Magistrate won't consider anything else if it goes to trial even if the video is misleading and I may get more punishment than pleading guilty at first instance.

Thanks