Pressing assault charges

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I was watching a show called Campus PD last night. A girl was punched in the face twice by a guy without cause. She decided not to press charges. I have seen similar situations where a person is punched and they do not file charges. There was no question about what happened and who was in teh wrong.

I don't understand this. If someone punched me, I would file charges in a heartbeat. It makes me wonder if I have some sort of hideen anger that other people do not have.

Why don't people feel the need to file police charges if they are assualted?

Last edited by KevinLA on 26 Jan 2010, 9:12 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Because when real fights happen, the police press charges themselves.

I've been assaulted and not pressed charges. I was pretty upset afterwards, and wasn't up to putting myself through the excruciating rigors of the legal system.

Instead, I reported it to a local agency that provides police with statistics. I wanted to do my part to keep the official crime rate as close to accurate as possible.

I also kind of appealed to the vigilante justice system - told my boyfriend, and the guy's girlfriend, and the guy's best friend's sister. Apparently, he had been doing this to other women for a long time, but none of them had the guts to do anything about it.

I was in a unique position because I could leave town and escape the gossip-based "revenge" that would be thrown back at me. This guy is sort of a local public figure / fixture, and he's really good at lying and manipulating people. A lot of people bought his lies, sided with him, and will indeed give me the cold shoulder when I come back.

But I don't care. I think I did the right thing. I stepped in to prevent other people from getting hurt, and vanished before getting to witness much drama. I know the guy's probably still going to the same pub and whining about how I "ruined his life" for about 12 hours each day. But his gf left him and I bet he's not getting laid anymore, which is good, for public health reasons . . .

Yeah, there are alternatives to going through the legal system, and in some cases, they are advantageous. It depends on the situation, I guess.

Could be any number of reasons. Maybe they don't want to have to go through with a trial. Maybe they're afraid the person who hit them will come after them, or friends of that person will come after them, and do worse. Maybe they don't trust the police or the courts. Who knows? I, like you, would press charges immediately if someone punched me in the face.

The whole process of filing charges is sometimes a lot more annoying than the punch itself.

I think a lot of it has to do with how much confidence people have in the juducial system. In Australia, the system is so weak that people convicted of assaults (often serious assaults) are placed on good behaviour bonds or given paltry fines. Such "punishments" only further humiliate the victim. I cannot remember the last time I read in the newspaper of someone actually being sent to jail for an assault.

Politicians in Australia wonder why on one hand, society is getting more violent (because assailants are not being punished) and on the other hand, why vigilante justice is on the rise (because victims will seek alternate justice where the system lets them down).

If the judiciary in the country had any guts, people convicted of assaults would receive manditory imprisonment.

Oh geez this junk was ON T.V.? Oh wow, how can someone be doing a story & not want to call the police? That sure does say something about the media doesn't it? Sounds like more garbage I don't tune into TV for.

http://g4tv.com/thefeed/blog/post/700830/g4-is-proud-to-present-campus-pd.html
I'm guessing this is the show you're talking about, am i right?