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The recent opinion piece in the Bangor Daily News by Patrisha McLean about domestic violence sentences calls for some context. I agree that domestic violence is a terrible and widespread problem, of course, and some of the stories in her piece are harrowing. However, I believe it’s reckless to suggest that all of the “sweetheart” plea agreements and dismissals that she lists (or dismissals or plea agreements in other cases) resulted from offenders getting lenient treatment when we don’t know the details of the cases themselves.
An “assault,” by statutory definition, does not have to involve anything more than “offensive physical contact,” and consequently some assault cases involve no more than a shove that causes no injury. Sometimes an alleged victim recants or is simply not credible, or the alleged victim was actually the main aggressor and the defendant used justified force in self-defense. And other times the case has been charged incorrectly. For example, there’s insufficient evidence of a required element of the offense, such as “family or household member” status.
I have seen all these issues and more arise in domestic violence cases and, thus, urge caution against speculation about the rationale for a plea agreement that seems like a sweetheart deal.
Zachary J. Smith
Bangor