Can Domestic Violence Charges Be Dropped in Illinois? Facing domestic violence charges in the state of Illinois? Attorney Andrew Russek from Combs Waterkotte discusses the possibility of domestic violence charges being dropped in Illinois.
Combs Waterkotte is a leading criminal defense law firm serving Illinois and Missouri. Our Illinois defense attorneys will fight for your freedom and rights. If you are facing domestic violence charges anywhere in Illinois, we can help. Call us at (312) 500-HELP 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
Interview Transcript
Scott Michael Dunn: Can domestic violence charges be dropped?
Andrew Russek: They can. Like any case, you can convince a prosecutor to drop them. A lot of times in domestics, it’s working out one of three different ways is the most common you see a domestic case dropped. There’s obviously the victim. Sometimes there’s some ulterior motive here like a child paternity case, or a divorce, and then suddenly the victim doesn’t wanna stand by their allegations anymore, whether they were true or not. Then, they’re showing the prosecutor, Hey, you charged this out the gate, but the evidence isn’t there. They don’t have injuries. Their statements are inconsistent, kind of a pretrial not-guilty, when showing the prosecutor, this is just a bogus case. Or there’s mitigation. Sometimes you are able to resolve these cases—you and your spouse or your family member work it out and you’re able to show the court through your attorney that you’ve addressed anger management, that you’ve done some community service, that maybe there are some limitations on the kind of contact you’ll have with this person. Where we can convince the state, this doesn’t need to be a felony, this person doesn’t need to go to jail, because the issues that they are concerned about have been addressed.
