Hey everybody, Dr. Judge here. A good Reddit post on somebody acting in self-defense charged with a Is it legal? Do they have a defense? Let's take a look. It looks like I'm being charged with a when I was acting in self-defense. Something out of New Mexico. What's going on here, Zach? >> So, this is a 27-year-old female, and it seems like her husband was in a fit of rage one day, and she grabbed his phone and wallet. After she did that, her husband came at her in a threatening manner. The user ended up scratching him in the process of trying to keep him off of her. Her husband called the cops, and she ended up going to jail, and is now being charged with a but she claims it was self-defense, and it was just a scratch. What's sort of your take on that? >> So, she's going to jail because of the domestic violence laws having been so much more powerful today than they used to be. In the '90s, an officer couldn't arrest for a misdemeanor that wasn't committed in his presence, and domestic violence was one of the first things that changed that law because if there was evidence of an and a police officer arrived on the scene, he didn't need the participation of the victim to prosecute. It just means that the state could arrest the without having seen the crime actually committed. What that means is when you're on a domestic call, and somebody has a scratch, like she's saying here, she did it in self-defense, but the police officer has to determine who the primary aggressor was. They obviously determined that she was the primary aggressor. I see this all the time in cases that we have where the police just got it wrong, and they picked the wrong person as the primary aggressor because they made more damage in defending themselves than the other person did assaulting them. Just because one person has a scratch and the other person doesn't, doesn't mean that the that the one with the scratch is the victim. The victim really could be acting in self-defense and cause injuries that are visible to the police, which caused the police to arrest the other person. It's a really tricky game there. >> How do you personally defend clients like who are in similar situation as this Reddit poster? What would What words of advice would you offer her? Well, in some cases, the only way you can defend that is with their testimony because you don't have any other evidence. You know, there's different kinds of evidence that you can present to defend somebody. One piece of evidence would be a video. If you happen to have a video or an audio tape of the event, you could present that, and that would be good evidence. But what if you don't have an audio or video? You put your client on the stand, and you say, "Tell the judge why you scratched him. Tell the judge why you did what you did, and what was the result of that. Tell the judge what this person was doing to you." Sometimes it just comes down to he said versus she said. Most judges in Nashville, if they're listening to that, and they can't tell who the primary aggressor was, they're going to dismiss the case. Just because you were arrested for it doesn't mean you're going to be convicted of it. >> Okay, got it. So, basically you're telling her that there is hope here. >> Oh, absolutely. You still have the opportunity to tell your story. You have your day in court, and you can tell the judge exactly why you did what you did. Some judges are good, some judges are not so much. Most judges understand that police can get it wrong sometimes. I mean, especially if it's just a scratch, right? I mean, goodness gracious. I think it's pretty compelling narrative that she was just trying to keep him off of her. Right. One of the most egregious ones that I've seen lately, we actually had a client who was charged with It was a very serious charge. I'm not going to give any names here. I'm not even going to tell you the county. She was charged with aggravated against her husband. She's the one that actually called the police cuz she was being While she was being she locked herself in the bathroom, called the police. We have the 911 tape where she called the police and and told the police what happened. While she's in the bathroom, the husband is out staging the scene to make it look like he was assaulted. He went in the kitchen, and he got a knife, and he laid it on the floor, and he turned the mattress upside down, and he made the scene look like he had to defend himself from being attacked by a knife. And so, when the police got there, he told the police, "She attacked me with this knife. Look, there's the knife." And he didn't have any marks on him. She did. However, he was able to convince the police officers that she was the primary aggressor. She attacked him with a knife, and she got arrested for aggravated. What do you do in that case? It just so happens that this particular client had a video camera set up to video birds outside of her window. He knew it was there, she knew it was there. It videoed 24 hours a day, and it would capture the birds during the daytime, but during the nighttime, guess what happens? The light changes outside, makes the window a mirror, and it videoed the inside. Well, guess what it caught? It caught the husband going to the butcher block, getting the knife, and planting it on the scene. It turned everything around. It made for one of those Perry Mason moments in court. >> That's a that's a remarkable story, David. I think last thing here that I'm noticing in this Reddit story is the woman who this poster said, "My husband is an asshole." I can't disagree with that. Hopefully, you're going to get an attorney who's going to be able to turn the tables around, and you can tell the judge that he was the primary aggressor.