Obviously the law is going to want to protect somebody who's pregnant. They're in a vulnerable state and the law is designed to protect that person. So if you commit a domestic violence or a battery against somebody that's pregnant, instead of it being a misdemeanor battery or a misdemeanor domestic violence, they're going to charge it as aggravated battery.
And that means second-degree felony, maximum of 15 years in prison with a mandatory at least 21 months in prison if you're convicted. The way we attack a case like that, there's a couple ways. One, we're going to reach out to the alleged victim and find out, do they want to press charges? Was this an argument that got out of hand? Do they really want to press forward and send their loved one to prison? The other thing that we're going to look into is the state has to prove that you knew or should have known that the alleged victim was pregnant. So obviously if it's your wife and she's 8 months pregnant, chances are you probably knew she was pregnant. But if she's only a month pregnant, hasn't told you yet, potentially we could make that as an argument. Or if it's somebody that you just met and had no reason to know that that person was pregnant, the state may not be able to prove that you knew or should have known.
And what that would do is it would force the state to reduce the charge from aggravated battery down to a simple misdemeanor battery, which creates a lot of flexibility in how we resolve the case. Either way, if you've been charged with aggravated battery on a pregnant woman, you need an attorney. You need somebody right away to get out in front of this to reach out to the alleged victim and do everything possible to keep you out of prison.
