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California Criminal Defense

Handling Cases Exclusively
In Ventura County California

Law Office of Paul Tyler

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805-889-9000

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Home / Criminal Defense / Domestic Violence

Domestic Violence Defense Attorney Serving Ventura County

Domestic violence arrests happen fast and on thin information: police respond to a 911 call, separate two upset people, and almost always arrest someone, usually based on who called first, who has a visible mark, or a one-sided account given in the heat of the moment. The Ventura County District Attorney’s office prosecutes these cases aggressively, and the consequences begin immediately: a night in jail, a protective order that can bar you from your own home and children, and a case that will proceed whether or not your partner wants it to. I have defended domestic violence cases in the Ventura County courts for 30 years. These cases are among the most personal and most defensible in criminal law, and what happens in the first two weeks often shapes everything. If you have been arrested for domestic violence anywhere in Ventura County, call me at 805-889-9000before your arraignment. The consultation is free.

The Two Main Charges

Corporal injury to an intimate partner (PC 273.5) requires a physical injury, however slight, a scratch, redness, a bruise. It is a wobbler: a misdemeanor carrying up to a year in county jail, or a felony carrying two, three, or four years in state prison (more with a prior DV conviction within seven years).

Domestic battery (PC 243(e)(1)) is the misdemeanor charge for unwanted touching of an intimate partner with no visible injury, a push, a grab, a slap that leaves no mark. Both require that the other person be an “intimate partner”: a current or former spouse, registered domestic partner, fiance or fiancee, cohabitant, the other parent of your child, or someone you are or were seriously dating. Related charges often filed alongside these include criminal threats (PC 422, a strike), stalking, vandalism (breaking a shared phone is routinely charged), and child endangerment when kids were present.

“My Partner Does Not Want to Press Charges. Will the Case Be Dropped?”

This is the question I am asked more than any other, and the answer surprises people: no, not automatically, and usually not at all. In California, the decision to prosecute belongs to the District Attorney, not the alleged victim. Ventura County prosecutors routinely go forward with cases where the partner recants, refuses to cooperate, or asks for the charges to be dropped, using the 911 recording, bodycam footage, photographs, and statements made the night of the arrest. That does not mean a non-cooperative alleged victim does not matter, it profoundly affects what the DA can prove and how the case gets resolved. But it has to be handled correctly: a defendant who pressures or even just contacts a protected partner can pick up new charges (violating the protective order, dissuading a witness) that are worse than the original case. Let me handle that dynamic. It is one of the most important things I do in these cases.

The Protective Order: The Consequence That Hits First

At your arraignment, before anything has been proven, the court will issue a criminal protective order. In its full form, it orders you to stay away from your partner entirely, which can mean being barred from your own home and separated from your children for the life of the case, even if your partner objects to the order. Here is what most people do not know: the court can instead issue a “peaceful contact” order, which allows you to live at home and be with your family while the case is pending, prohibiting only harassment or violence. Whether you get the full stay-away order or the peaceful-contact version is argued at arraignment, and it is one of the most consequential arguments in the entire case. I appear at arraignments prepared to make it, often with input from the protected party properly presented through counsel.

What a Conviction Actually Costs

  • Jail or prison, fines, and victim restitution
  • A mandatory 52-week batterer’s intervention program, required by statute on every grant of DV probation, no exceptions
  • Firearms: a lifetime ban. Federal law imposes a lifetime firearm prohibition for misdemeanor DV convictions, and since 2019 California law does the same for a misdemeanor PC 273.5 conviction. If you own guns, hunt, or work in any field requiring firearm access, this alone can justify fighting the charge or negotiating the count.
  • A protective order lasting up to ten years
  • Immigration consequences, DV convictions are deportable offenses, making the precise charge of conviction critical for non-citizens
  • Family law fallout, a DV conviction creates a presumption against custody in family court
  • A permanent record affecting employment, licensing, and housing

One important honest note: judicial diversion is not available for domestic violence charges, the Legislature specifically excluded PC 273.5 and 243(e)(1) from the misdemeanor diversion statute. That makes the path to a clean outcome different here than in other misdemeanor cases: it runs through challenging the evidence, negotiating to a non-DV charge, or, in appropriate cases, mental health diversion. All the more reason these cases need experienced counsel rather than a quick plea.

Defending Domestic Violence Charges

  • Self-defense and mutual combat. Many DV arrests come from two-sided altercations where police simply picked a side. Injuries on my client, the sequence of the 911 calls, and witness accounts often tell the real story.
  • False allegations. Divorce, custody disputes, and breakups generate fabricated or exaggerated accusations, and the timing of an allegation relative to a custody filing is evidence.
  • Accident and lack of intent. Injuries that occurred during a chaotic moment, pulling away, blocking a door, are not willful infliction of injury.
  • The injury and its cause. PC 273.5 requires a traumatic condition caused by your act; medical records and photographs frequently do not match the narrative.
  • Recantation handled correctly. When the complaining witness’s account changes, the admissibility of the original statements becomes the battleground, and that is a legal fight, fought with motions, not phone calls.
  • Charge reduction. Even where some conduct occurred, reducing a felony 273.5 to a misdemeanor, or a DV charge to a non-DV offense like simple battery or disturbing the peace, changes everything that follows: the gun ban, the 52-week program, immigration exposure, and the family court presumption.

30 Years Defending These Cases in Ventura County

I practice almost exclusively in the Ventura County courts, more than 20,000 court appearances, and domestic violence cases are a constant part of that practice. I know how the DA’s office files and negotiates these cases, which judges grant peaceful-contact orders, and what it takes to keep one bad night from defining the rest of your life. Not every case can be dismissed, but what starts as a felony very frequently does not end as one. Call me at 805-889-9000. I answer my own phone, 24/7, and the consultation is free and confidential. Serving Ventura, Oxnard, Camarillo, Thousand Oaks, Simi Valley, and all of Ventura County.