South Carolina Assault and Battery Defense Attorney

Types of Assault and Battery Charges

Though these two offenses are combined into a single charge, an assault and battery charge may have many different degrees and aggravating factors that ultimately determine the punishment. We’ll cover the different levels of SC assault and battery charges below.

Assault and Battery 3rd Degree South Carolina

Third-degree assault and battery, also referred to as SC simple assault charges, fall into the lowest level of severity when it comes to these types of charges. This is because assault in the third degree often entails minor injuries and/or violence.

A person may be charged with third-degree assault and battery if they cause or attempt to cause minor injuries or threaten to injure another person with the power to hurt them. A third-degree assault and battery conviction is a misdemeanor and typically carries a short jail sentence and a relatively small fine. However, the conviction will still appear on a person’s criminal record and may make it difficult for them to get work or housing in Greenville or elsewhere.

Assault and Battery 2nd Degree South Carolina

Second-degree assault and battery is similar to third-degree with one distinctive difference. This difference is that the harm or injury that occurred (or attempted) must meet a certain standard or level of injury: moderate bodily injury. According to S.C. Code § 16-3-600(a)(2), moderate bodily injury is defined as “physical injury that involves prolonged loss of consciousness, or that causes temporary or moderate disfigurement or temporary loss of the function of a bodily member or organ, or injury that requires medical treatment when the treatment requires the use of regional or general anesthesia or injury that results in a fracture or dislocation.”

State law goes on to say that moderate bodily injury DOES NOT include bodily harm that requires one-time treatment rather than extensive medical care, including scratches, cuts, bruises, and the like. Second-degree assault and battery is still a misdemeanor offense in South Carolina, but carries more severe consequences like longer confinement times and heftier fines.

Assault and Battery 1st Degree South Carolina

When the crime of assault and battery in the first degree occurs, it becomes a felony offense. To be classified as first-degree assault and battery, the defendant must have inflicted great bodily injury upon the victim. Also found in § 16-3-600(a)(1), great bodily injury is defined by the state as “bodily injury which causes a substantial risk of death or which causes serious, permanent disfigurement or protracted loss or impairment of the function of a bodily member or organ.”

Other factors that when present may result in a first degree assault charge include:

• Injuring a victim and touching the victim’s private parts with lewd and lascivious intent;
  • “Private parts” refer to the genital area, buttocks, or breasts of a female.
  • “Lewd and lascivious intent” refers to sexual conduct that is offensive to public standards of decency.
• Injuring a victim during the commission of a kidnapping, robbery, burglary, or other theft crime;
• And injuring a victim with the means to kill them or produce great bodily injury.

Though first degree assault and battery is a very serious crime with severe penalties, it is still a lesser included offense than the charges we will describe below.

SC Assault and Battery of a High and Aggravated Nature

In South Carolina, aggravated assault and battery charges are referred to as “Assault and Battery of a High and Aggravated Nature,” or ABHAN for short. In order for a person to be convicted of Assault and Battery of a High and Aggravated Nature, a few key elements must be met. These elements are what are known as aggravating factors. Aggravating factors in South Carolina include the actual infliction of great bodily harm or injury as well as the fact that the act is accomplished by means likely to produce death or great bodily injury.

ABHAN is a lesser included crime of attempted murder, which means it’s included in an attempted murder indictment. However, this does not necessarily mean that aggravated assaults are always murder attempts.