bonlike@... asked this question on 3/31/2000:

My son (at college) was the victim of an unprovoked assault (other student barged in thru the front door) and started hitting him. (The assailant heard the friend who witnessed the beating screaming) and ran out of the house only to slash three of the tires on my son's car. My husband and I called the father and then the kid to discuss this and his uncontrolled anger, etc. and we requested to have the kid see a therapist of our choosing and follow a treatment plan. Both the father and son feel we are being unreasonable and that it was an isolated incident and "Just a bad error in judgment". We feel our son's safety continues to be at risk until we can determine this boy's mental health. Is there any presence of psychosis? (He left a recorded message on a friend's machine that he wanted to kill my son or hire someone to have him killed). If they refuse treatment, we feel we must file a police report and meet with the District Attorney. We have been told this is an extremely wealthy family who believes they can buy their way out of any situation. Can you advise us 1) About victim's rights? 2) Is there an organization that educates children (20 year olds) how to diffuse anger with words? 3) Can people buy their way out of the system as we have read about? If so, how can we be sure they can't by handling this in a way that will stop that course?

lakers gave this response on 3/31/2000:

There are two ways to approach this situation within the legal system: file criminal charges or proceed against the assailant in a civil action.

Regarding criminal charges: time has now passed since the assault and vandalism. The police should have been immediately called. If they were- great. That means there is a police report that will likely be passed along to a prosecuting agency. If not, you would have to go the police station with the correct jurisdiction and they will take what is called a "counter report." Counter reports document incidents, but are sometimes not passed along for prosecution. You would have to take a statement from the witness, or have that witness go along to give a statement. Tell them that you want the case prosecuted. If the case is sent to a prosecuting agency, that agency may reject the case because a report was not made in a timely fashion. If they do file charges, it will likely be for misdemeanor assault and vandalism, unless the damage to the car is over a certain dollar amount that would make it a felony. It doesn't sound like it is. Then the case would proceed to a guilty plea or to trial, depending on the stance of the assailant. If the defendant is convicted, as part of probation, he can be ordered to stay away from your son and possibly be ordered to complete a psychiatric evaluation and anger management counseling. It will depend on the probation officer's recommendations and the judge's inclinations on the day of sentencing.

The next choice is to proceed against the assailant in a civil action. That would mean you would have to pay an attorney to bring suit against the assailant for damages to your son and his car. This takes time and money. You also run the risk of not receiving any damages after trial, depending on the vagaries of the jury system. If the damages are not too great, your son could proceed in small claims court and represent himself. This will not, however, result in the assailant being ordered into psychiatric counseling.

My advice to you is to definitely get a temporary restraining order against the assailant, which will at least allow your son to call the police if the guy gets near him. And they can arrest him for it. However, it does nothing to protect your son from physical harm.

You also need to consider whether engaging in protracted litigation against this assailant might be something he'd enjoy. It will give him another opportunity to put your son on the spot- on the witness stand where he can be grilled by an expensive defense lawyer hired by the family. Litigation in any form is a miserable experience. The guy sounds like he definitely has problems, but just think of the OJ Simpson case if you wonder if justice can be bought. Lady Justice isn't blindfolded. She's looking around and winking at people with money, political influence and power. Many lawyers are incompetent and many judges can be ignorant because they were appointed because of political contributions not brainpower. I'm not saying the system is completely tainted, but it's the luck of the draw.

Use your common sense. Decide what you want to get out of this situation. If it is the safety of your son, get the TRO, have him be careful and call police whenever the assailant gets near him. Restricted contact can be ordered on the assailant and any third party he might have try to contact your son. If you want to "fix" this kid by getting him psychiatric help- it probably is useless. Like alcoholics, drug addicts and people with problems, if they are in denial (and in this case it sounds like his family is encouraging/enabling that) the counseling will have little/no effect.

As for victim rights groups, they usually will accompany a victim to court if that person needs the support. Their presence in a courtroom sometimes has a positive effect on the judge who behaves more appropriately because he knows he/she is being watched. Their influence outside of that is little.

Best of luck.

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