We can all agree that some all crimes are different, however, killing is killing when we analyze the main point of the word. Even though the killing is a sin, it doesn’t matter if someone does it to defend himself, or from the unknown reasons. However, the justice system classifies killing into different categories based on the intend and other justifiable factors.
The same thing goes for aggravated assault in Texas, because it is different than common assault due to its seriousness. The main factors for aggravated assaults are use of weapon, the intent of the perpetrator, the status of the victim and the degree of injury.
However, different states have carious criminal codes for aggravated assault such as assault with a deadly weapons, felonies, while misdemeanors are simple assaults. Also states have various degrees of charges for aggravated assault.
We decided to present you different factors that make the common assault into an aggravated one:
Using Deadly Weapon
According to law and justice system, the use of deadly weapons makes the assault aggravated. In most cases, this applies even if you have never used it or caused injury with it.
On the other hand, common assaults do not reaquire physical harm, but it means that felon behaves in some way that could make victim fear for its safety. Even if you threat the person and have teh deadly weapon, you entered the world of aggravated assaults.
If you are asking yourself what weapons are considered as the deadly ones, the answer is quite simple: if the weapon has the ability to cause serious injury or even death. Of course, it includes using guns.
It is essential to create a background and to constitute in which manners felon used the weapon in the assault. For example, according to law pocket knife is not a leathel weapon as it is, but if someone attacks you and hold it to your neck, it could end bad for you, which means that it becomes deadly.
Status Of The Victim
The status of the victim is also important way to classify whether the assault was aggravated or not. In most states when someone attacks fire fighters, police officers and even in some states teachers, law considers it as aggravated assault.
Of course, the victims must be on his or hers duty during the assault and the status of assault and victim will create groundworks during the decision.
Apart from the common punishment, when you assault a member of protected class, that could also become hate crime. Most of them start because of ethnicity, race, religion, national origin, disability of the victim and sexual orientation.
The Mental State Of Felon
The another factor that could push the assault from the common to aggravated one is the mental state of the felon. If she or he acted with the main intend to cause harm, it reaches the point when it becomes aggravated.
Everything depends on the state, which means that in some you can constitute it as reckless behaivor with teh indifference to human life.
On teh toher hand, the perpetrator doesn’t have to have the specific intend to cause harm or to injure anyone. The factors increase by using deadly or dangerous weapons.
For more information on mental state of people who become felons, you can find by clicking here.
Degree Of Injury
Everything depends on the seriousness of injury to the victim by the assault before the justice can call it aggravated. It is important to state that most assaults that cause severe bodily injuries can fit in that description.
Life threatening injuries will also qualify as the severe injury, as well as other that could disfigure or main the victim. In some states, you can find that the level of punishment depends on the particular injuries.
On the other hand, in case that assault can cause minor physical injury that could lead to deathly consequences, most states will punish the felon with it.
Conclusion:
As you can see from everything that we have mentioned above, the facotrs depend on specific and individual proofs and there is no way to generalize everything into one simple scenario. However, the protection is essential, which means that you have to consider the law of the state you’re living in. That will protect you in case of future problems.