Battery
Nevada criminal battery is any willful and unlawful use of force or violence upon the person of another.
2. Battery
Nevada defines criminal battery as “any willful and unlawful use of force or violence upon the person of another.” NRS 200.481(1)(a).
- The phrase “willful and unlawful” establishes that battery is a general intent crime: The defendant need only intend some use of force or violence against the other person.
- This basic definition of battery does not require that the force or violence cause bodily harm.
- The intentional use of any “force or violence” is sufficient.
- Any unwanted touching or “offensive contact” can constitute the “use of force or violence.” Hobbs v. State, 127 Nev. 234, 238-239, 251 P.3d 177, 179-180 (2011).
- The defendant need not touch the complainant directly. Striking another person with a thrown object, for example, is sufficient to establish a “use of force or violence” against that person [if the defendant intended a harmful or offensive contact with the complainant’s body].
Nevada criminal battery is any willful and unlawful use of force or violence upon the person of another. Intend the contact, and it is a battery whether or not it hurt and whether or not you touched the person yourself, as long as the contact was unwanted or offensive and the act was unlawful.
Three ideas carry the whole concept, and each one is a place where students overcomplicate things.
- 1General intent: the words willful and unlawful make battery a general intent crime. The defendant need only intend some use of force or violence against the other person. The defendant does not have to intend an injury, a serious result, or any particular degree of harm. If the defendant means to make the contact, the intent element is satisfied.
- 2No harm required: the basic definition does not require that the force or violence cause bodily harm. The intentional use of any force or violence is enough on its own, and the bar is low. Any unwanted touching or offensive contact can qualify: a hard shove that leaves no mark, a deliberate poke, an angry flick, spitting on someone, all are uses of force or violence even though no injury follows.
- 3Contact need not be direct: the defendant does not have to touch the complainant with the defendant's own body. Striking a person with a thrown object is enough to establish a use of force or violence against that person, so long as the defendant intended a harmful or offensive contact with the person's body. A defendant who hurls a cup at someone, meaning to hit them, has used force on that person just as surely as one who strikes with a fist.
Battery = willful + unlawful use of force or violence on another.
General intent: intend the contact, not the harm.
Mean to make the touch and you are there.
no harm required.
Any unwanted touching or offensive contact counts as 'force or violence.' A harmless shove, a poke, a spit, all qualify.
'No injury' is never a defense to basic battery.
Contact need not be direct.
Throwing an object that hits the person is force on the person, if the defendant intended a harmful or offensive contact.
'Never touched him myself' is not a defense.
Two regulars at a bar get into a shouting match. One of them, meaning to humiliate the other, flicks a full cup of soda so that it splashes across the other's face and shirt. The other is not injured at all, just wet and embarrassed. Is that battery?
Suppose the cup slips out of the flicker's hand by accident while gesturing, with no intent to make any contact. Now the general intent to use force is missing, the defendant did not mean to make the contact, and there is no battery.
A sympathetic 'No' resting on a true-but-irrelevant fact: the contact caused no injury, left no mark, or was only a minor shove or jab.
Basic battery requires no bodily harm and has no minimum-severity threshold; the intentional use of any force or violence, including an unwanted or offensive contact, is sufficient.An option that adds a requirement to the element, for example that the defendant must have intended to injure, or must have personally and directly touched the complainant.
Battery is a general intent crime; the defendant need only intend some use of force or violence, and the contact need not be direct (a thrown object counts).An option that frames the case in negligence (a failure to use care) or relabels it as a different offense (disorderly conduct).
Battery requires intent to make the contact, not carelessness, and it is established by the willful, unlawful use of force on the person, not by a different offense label.A correct 'Yes' keyed on the resulting harm, the victim's humiliation, or an intent to injure, rather than on the intentional use of force.
The operative basis is the willful, unlawful use of force or violence (the intended unwanted contact); harm and intent to injure are not required.a defendant makes some physical contact with another person, or sends a thing into another person, and the question asks whether it is battery, usually loading the facts with 'no injury,' 'left no mark,' or 'never touched him directly.' Run the three checks.
Did the defendant intend to make the contact (general intent, not intent to injure)?
Was the contact unwanted or offensive, so it counts as a use of force or violence?
And was the act unlawful?
If yes, it is battery, and the absence of harm, the small degree of the touching, and the use of an object rather than a hand are all true-but-irrelevant facts.
The only real escape hatches are no intent to make any contact (an accident) or a contact that was neither unwanted nor offensive.
Annoyed that a coworker kept leaning into his workspace, an office employee deliberately gave the coworker a firm two-handed shove in the chest to push him back. The coworker stumbled a step but was not hurt in any way, suffered no mark or bruise, and felt only startled and offended. The employee meant to make the shove and had no lawful reason to put his hands on the coworker.
Is the employee guilty of battery?
At a tense town meeting, a heckler in the back row wanted to embarrass a speaker at the podium. He picked up a half-full water bottle and threw it so that it struck the speaker squarely on the shoulder. The heckler intended the bottle to hit the speaker. The speaker was not injured by the impact and felt only the thump of the bottle and a flash of indignation. The heckler had no lawful justification for throwing the bottle.
Is the heckler guilty of battery?
A commuter on a packed subway platform was waving his arms while telling an animated story. Without noticing the woman standing beside him, he swung his hand back and his knuckles bumped her arm. He had not meant to touch her or anyone else and was simply gesturing as he spoke. The woman was unhurt but startled by the contact. The commuter immediately apologized, explaining he had not realized she was there.
Is the commuter guilty of battery?
Furious during a parking dispute, a driver leaned out of her car window and spat directly onto the face of a pedestrian standing nearby. She meant to spit on him to show her contempt. The pedestrian was not physically injured and suffered no lasting effect beyond disgust at being spat upon. The driver had no lawful reason for her conduct.
Is the driver guilty of battery?
During a crowded concert, one fan grew irritated with a taller fan blocking his view. Meaning to make the taller fan move, he jabbed his finger hard into the taller fan's back several times. The taller fan was not hurt by the jabs but found them plainly unwelcome and turned around angrily. The jabbing fan had no lawful basis for putting his hands on the other person.
Is the jabbing fan guilty of battery?