Would I be arrested?

Maximum Triceratops

Maximum Triceratops

Maximum Triceratops

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Hi ladies, ok following on from the cinema chav thread it got me thinking, if I was there when the lad was being puched and I went to help him out and knocked a couple of the chavs out in the process, would I get arrested for assault?
Maybe one of the resident Police Officers could answer this?
Cheers
Maximum

*Edit* sorry never made it clear, I think I probably would be arrested but my question is, would I likely be charged and found guilty of assault?
 
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It depends if your actions were proportionate.

If he was in genuine danger and you weren't going out of your way to cause undue harm, then you'd probably be OK.

Knocking people out might not go over too well though.
 
Yes undoubtedly. Your actions will be micro-analysed after the fact in a cold light and it will be almost impossible for you to intervene without using what the law regards unreasonable force.
 
Maximum Triceratops said:
Hi ladies, ok following on from the cinema chav thread it got me thinking, if I was there when the lad was being puched and I went to help him out and knocked a couple of the chavs out in the process, would I get arrested for assault?
Maybe one of the resident Police Officers could answer this?
Cheers
Maximum
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Yes. It happened to me a few years ago. Stepped in to stop 3 yobs beating up on a kid in a park. Anyway cut a long story short, when the Police arrived (I called them prior to helping out) I was arrested along with the 2 of the three perps. The 3rd had run off when I'd taken out his two buddies.

Anyway, after a two hour wait in a police cell and a short interview, I was released without charge when it was made clear by another witness that the boy would have been beaten to death had I not done something.

The 2 perps were given a conditional discharge and a community service order respectively.

And people wonder why others do nothing?
 
I once stepped in on some guys harrassing a girl. I have some boxing and muay thai training so I figured if a couple of drunks got too angry, I could handle myself. I approached the guys, but they were clearly in no mood to talk, and, well, attacked. I threw one punch, a guy went down and the rest of them backed off. Fair enough. I didn't punch with full force, but landed a good one so the guy was out. I don't think I broke anything, and even did my best to catch him so he wouldn't fall head first. And then I spent 14 days in jail.

Unfortunately, today it's better to not step in unless you don't mind suffering for it for a bit.
 
Dr.EM said:
What about arm locks or just pulling them aside? How is that seen by the law?
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if you restrain then it's fine you are within your legal rights to make a citizens arrest, you just can't beat ten bails of **** out of them to do it though.
 
Simple answer: Don't throw the first punch. Everything after is self defence. If you're seen stomping his face into the floor... it's not self defence. Say things like "I don't want to fight you" just so witnesses can see. Then after he's taken a swing, knock them the **** out. When questioned by the police stress that you were defending yourself and only used what force you felt was necessary. You were in 'fear for your life'. Epic win.

Not saying it'll keep you out of jail, but it's a better course of action.

When confronting the person look for tale tale signs of his first move. IE watch on the left arm, he's right handing. 90% chance he'll aim for the fast with a hook the first shot. Check behind you for any of his friends, try to have your back to a wall.

Oh... and never mention you've had ANY fight training/self defence classes.
 
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Larkspeed said:
if you restrain then it's fine you are within your legal rights to make a citizens arrest, you just can't beat ten bails of **** out of them to do it though.
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I wouldn't attempt a citizens arrest unless I was very familiar with the law on it. A guy round my way got arrested and charged with child kidnapping when he did a citizens arrest on a kid who was throwing stones at his window. Apparently his mistake was taking the kid into his house and phoning the police instead of marching the kid down to the nearest police station. Ask yourself if you know where the nearest police station is to the local cinema. Anyway the guy only got the charges dropped thanks the intervention of his MP who put pressure on the CPS to drop it.
 
Of course you would be arrested. Doesn't mean you will be charged. Police don't know what happened, that you didn't start it or used excess force. Untill they get statements and any evidence, they aren't going to take your word for it over someone else.
 
Hmm, seems like quite a grey area, but iirc there were 6 of them and if they were all throwing punches at the poor lad, then if someone dished a few falcon puches out in order for them to stop, then potentialy I could be saving his life?
 
Maximum Triceratops said:
Hi ladies, ok following on from the cinema chav thread it got me thinking, if I was there when the lad was being puched and I went to help him out and knocked a couple of the chavs out in the process, would I get arrested for assault?
Maybe one of the resident Police Officers could answer this?
Cheers
Maximum

*Edit* sorry never made it clear, I think I probably would be arrested but my question is, would I likely be charged and found guilty of assault?
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Hi mate, it's good to know you would have helped me out :)

Yeah, if you had done something big, like knocked one of them out or something, you'd probably get charged with assault.

I'm not angry that no one intervened when they were hitting me. Because people were telling them to stop it, and trying to help me out like that. But I'm annoyed that the smallest guy in the cinema had to tell them to pack it in
 
Maximum Triceratops said:
Hmm, seems like quite a grey area, but iirc there were 6 of them and if they were all throwing punches at the poor lad, then if someone dished a few falcon puches out in order for them to stop, then potentialy I could be saving his life?
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Yes but bear in mind that just one falcon punch could end up with you in prison serving a life sentence E.g. the falcon punch causes someone to fall and hit their head, or the recipient has a bad kidney and the falcon punch ruptures it.
 
Maximum Triceratops said:
Hi ladies, ok following on from the cinema chav thread it got me thinking, if I was there when the lad was being puched and I went to help him out and knocked a couple of the chavs out in the process, would I get arrested for assault?
Maybe one of the resident Police Officers could answer this?
Cheers
Maximum

*Edit* sorry never made it clear, I think I probably would be arrested but my question is, would I likely be charged and found guilty of assault?
Click to expand...

Oh course how else will they meet their targets.
 
Moses99p said:
Because the police arriving at a scene, then taking everyone away (because they couldn't know who was telling porkies), then subsequently establishing that you were all good, was a really bad thing to happen? I'm glad they made sure they had the right people, then let the ~good guy~ go :confused:.
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Problem is that without my Solicitor, the Witness and the fact I was a serving Soldier at the time it was made clear that next time I would be charged with assault and something along the lines of false imprisonment(they called it something else that I can't recall) as I detained two of the assailants.

My solicitor said at the time that if I were defending myself then fine, but technically I attacked them and so if the CPS had wanted to charge me they could have. he told me that charging a serving Officer on leave from the Iraq war would have created bad press so I was lucky. His advice was "next time, walk on by".
 
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