Long Beach Domestic Violence Defense Lawyer

The charges

What you are actually charged with

Most Long Beach domestic violence cases are filed under one of two sections. Penal Code 273.5, corporal injury to a spouse, cohabitant, dating partner, or the other parent of your child, requires a visible or diagnosable injury, a “traumatic condition,” and can be charged as a felony or a misdemeanor. Penal Code 243(e)(1), domestic battery, requires only offensive touching, no injury, and is a misdemeanor.

Related charges often ride along: criminal threats under Penal Code 422, which can be a felony and a strike; vandalism for a broken phone or door; dissuading a witness for asking the other person not to call the police; and violating a protective order once one exists. The charging decision is made by the Los Angeles County District Attorney for felonies and the Long Beach City Prosecutor for misdemeanors in the city, not by the person who called.

Sources: Penal Code 1385, dismissal authority; 18 U.S.C. 922(g)(9), federal firearm prohibition.

The protective order

Why you cannot go home, and how that changes

Police responding to a domestic call in California will usually make an arrest if there is any sign of injury, and will often obtain an emergency protective order on the spot that bars you from the home and from contact. At arraignment the court issues a criminal protective order that typically lasts through the case. Violating it, even with a text the other person invited, is a new charge and the fastest way to lose a defensible case.

Protective orders can be modified. Courts regularly convert a no-contact order to a “peaceful contact” order when the protected person asks and the facts support it, which lets families communicate about children and finances. That request is made through the court, never around it.

The defense

How these cases are defended

• Self-defense: injuries on you, the 911 caller’s own conduct, and the physical evidence often tell a different story than the first report
• Accident: whether the injury resulted from a willful act must be examined; separating, restraining, or leaving does not by itself establish a defense
• False or exaggerated allegation, most often in the middle of a custody dispute or a separation, tested against texts, timelines, and prior reports
• Insufficient evidence of a “traumatic condition,” which can move a 273.5 felony to a misdemeanor or out of the case
• Challenges to statements taken without proper warnings, to body-camera gaps, and to photographs taken hours later
• Negotiation toward a non-domestic-violence disposition where the evidence supports it, which may reduce some consequences; the actual offense, relationship, and applicable state and federal law must be checked rather than relying on the charge’s label

The office

How the Law Offices of Patrick S. Aguirre defends domestic violence cases

The office has defended people accused of crimes in Long Beach and across Los Angeles County for nearly three decades, in the Long Beach courthouse and the county’s other criminal courts, from offices in Long Beach and Downey. Domestic violence cases are worked from the evidence outward: the 911 recording, the body-camera footage, the photographs and their timestamps, the medical records if any, and the history between the two people. Where the evidence supports it the office fights for dismissal or acquittal; where it does not, the goal is a disposition that keeps the label, the program, and the lifetime consequences off your record.

The office speaks Spanish. Family members are often the ones calling, and the office works with them within the limits the protective order sets.