Are you charged with domestic assault? Mischief? Criminal Harassment?

Utter Threats? Forcible Confinement? Choking?

Perrin Valli, Guelph Domestic Assault Lawyer has represented countless clients charged with domestic violence offences before the Guelph criminal court and can help you with your case.

It is crucial to start developing your defence strategy from day 1 and for that, you need to choose the right lawyer for your case. Perrin has the necessary experience and works hard to give his clients the best defence.

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What is domestic assault? What are domestic violence offences?

A domestic assault is simply an assault inflicted on an intimate partner - usually a spouse or girlfriend/boyfriend.

Any charge that is alleged to have been committed against an intimate partner will be treated by the prosecution as a domestic violence offence. These offences are most often:

• Mischief;

• Criminal Harassment;

• Uttering Threats to Cause Death or Bodily Harm;

• Assault, Assault with a Weapon, Assault Causing Bodily Harm;

• Choking, or Overcoming Resistance by Choking.

Are my spouse’s assertions to police evidence?

Police need “reasonable and probable grounds” to believe that someone has committed an offence before they are permitted to charge that person with a criminal offence.

Police can form reasonable and probable grounds from assertions made by a witness or victim, even if they have no corroborative evidence such as video or audio recordings or statements from independent witnesses.

Can I see my children?

Often following an arrest for domestic violence charges, the police will impose conditions on the accused which prohibit the accused from seeing his or her children.

This can be devastating, not just emotionally for both the parent and the children, but also because it can have knock-on effects in family law litigation.

In some circumstances, it is possible to seek a quick variation to those conditions (with permission of the court) to allow the accused person to be able to see his or her kids. Most often, when this is allowed, the court will allow a third party to be the go-between from one parent to the other to arrange pick-ups and drop offs.

This type of a variation to pre-trial release conditions may not be accepted by a bail Court Justice in all cases, and are frequently rejected where the children were alleged victims of the offences with with the accused is charged, or if the children were witness to the offences alleged.

You must speak with your lawyer to determine if a variation in your case is likely to succeed and how to best approach an variation application in your case.

Be very careful not to breach any of your pre-trial release conditions

It is a criminal offence to breach any of the conditions imposed on you either by police at the time of your release or by a bail Court Justice.

Breaches of these conditions will result in further arrest, charges and upon conviction, can attract jail sentences.

Breaches of pre-trial release conditions can often alter the nature of a case and ruin a well-planned defence strategy.

As a result, it is crucial not to breach any of your Officer-In-Charge undertakings or Release Order conditions.

Is there any up front counselling that I can do to help myself and my case?

If you feel that you have some issues you need to resolve, and are interested in pursuing personal counselling, there are lots of resources and supports available in the community.

Often as a condition of a resolution agreement, the Prosecution will require an accused person to successfully complete the “PAR” program. PAR stands for the Partner Assault Response program. This is a 12-week group counselling and education session aimed to help with developing tools for non-abusive conflict resolution. In Guelph, this program is run by Family Counselling and Support Services. They often restrict their PAR programs to persons mandated to complete the program by the Court (most often as a term of probation or a peace bond). Nevertheless, there are organizations or professionals outside of Guelph who offer the PAR program more broadly.

Private counsellors offering anger management counselling are also widely available throughout Guelph and Southern Ontario.

If you are seeking resources to assist with addiction or substance abuse problems, call Here 24/7 at 1-844-436-3247 to explore the resources available locally. Also see my blog post on accessing government-funded residential addiction treatment.