Hi. Long story short a girl pressed assault charges on me. Her cousin told me that the POLICE are pressing charges. Can the police press charges? (I haven't even spoken to them yet. They've never contacted me.)
Yes, it really depends under the state law in the state you live in they allow the police/district attorney to press the charges. If there are witnesses or injuries it do longer becomes the victims choice so the state will press the charges under there domestic violence or assault/battery laws.
There is no private criminal prosecution in the u.s The police decide whether the investigate and whether to arrest and do not need the permission of the victim to do so. Then, the DA decides whether to spend the taxpayers money to seek a conviction and does not need the victim's permission. The victim can neither compel nor prohibit prosecution of a crime.
Yes. If a crime is serious enough, it becomes the crown's decision to prosecute you rather than the victim deciding whether to press charges. You don't have to give a particularly savage beating to reach this threshold.
Can police press charges? No, they pass it to the D.A and the D.A will decide if charges can or should be pressed , then the police will come , arrest and question you, you know investigate everything and everyone but you being the accused are the one arrested !
Let me walk you through this. The girl files a complaint with the police. This can be as simple as calling the police and telling them you assaulted her, then answering their questions when they come out to talk to her. She really doesn't press any charges, but people say she is pressing the charges if she doesn't retract her story and says she thinks you should be punished for what you did. The police decide if they have enough evidence for an arrest (they don't always get this right). Assuming that the girl tells a credible story, and all the other evidence adds up, the police arrest you, take you to jail, and prepare an arrest/incident report for the DA. While you sit stewing in jail (even if only for a few minutes), the DA reviews the evidence that the police have gathered, and decides whether to press charges or not. The DA is the person who actually presses the charges.
