Rockville Domestic Violence Charges

Domestic violence in Rockville can negatively impact your day-to-day life. It can damage personal and professional relationships alike. Adding to the stress, the legal process for these charges in can be complicated. Speaking to a driven Rockville domestic violence lawyer can help you to better understand the process and help you know what to expect.

Domestic Violence vs. Assault in Maryland

Domestic violence is actually the exact same as the Rockville assault statutes, whether simple assault or a felony assault. You can have domestic violence charges in both circumstances and the definition is going to be the same. The only difference is that in a domestic violence case the individuals who are party to the criminal charges must either live together in some domestic capacity or be in some kind of a romantic relationship with each other that would define the case as domestic violence.

Difficulty of Domestic Violence Charges from a Client’s Perspective

Domestic violence charges are difficult from a client’s perspective because the client usually is not only in a relationship with the victim of the assault, but also they may have children in common with that individual, lived with that individual, shared bills with that individual and had other shared responsibilities. The extended families may have relationships with each other. Usually when domestic violence charges occur, all of those things are affected by the charges themselves.
One of the parties may be asked to move out of the house and they may not be able to have contact with each other until the case is resolved. They may not have contact with their children until the case is resolved. From a client’s perspective a domestic violence charge does not just start or finish in a criminal courtroom, it impacts every other aspect of their life as well, because the complainant to the domestic violence case is somebody with whom they are usually living.

Typical Domestic Violence Situations in Rockville

Typically speaking, domestic violence charges arise when individuals who are in a relationship with each other or reside with each other get into a disagreement and it turns physical. When the police are called, they conduct the investigation in the same fashion they would for any other kind of assault case. They collect evidence, take photographs of injuries, speak to witnesses, and get statements. What gets a more detailed review in domestic violence cases is how the aftercare of the victims is handled.
Since the victim and the accused usually reside together, Rockville police officers do take it upon themselves to assist one of the parties in finding another place to reside until at least the bond review hearing can take place and determinations can be made about whether the individual has permission to return to the home pending the resolution of the case in court. How the police officers and the attorney’s office get involved in the actual family moving forward from the event while the charges are pending is what is unique to domestic violence cases as opposed to other assault-related charges.

First Steps to Take for Domestic Violence Charges

The first thing you should do is contact your domestic violence lawyer to discuss what exactly took place and what the circumstances were, and then an experienced Rockville domestic assault attorney will explain to you exactly what the appropriate next steps are. For example, if the domestic violence was related to alcohol then the defense attorney might say that step two has something to do with targeting an alcohol issue and addressing it. If it was drug related he might tell you to address it with some kind of drug education program. If it was simply anger related, the attorney might tell you to begin work with an anger management program. The first thing is always to talk to an attorney so you can find out what steps you should take.

Importance of Speaking to a Rockville Domestic Violence Attorney

It is important to speak to a Rockville domestic violence attorney so you can find out exactly what it is that you need to do to work towards the appropriate resolution of your case. The domestic assault attorney will want you to address the issues that originally arose and caused you to act in a certain way on that particular occasion, such as you drank too much alcohol so they had you go into an alcohol education program. A judge seeing that you have addressed that issue before the court date would give the judge, the prosecutor and perhaps the victim of the domestic violence assault some solace in knowing that whatever the motivation was for the problem, it was resolved at that point.