Domestic Violence Defense

A domestic violence arrest changes everything in a single night. Police in California are required to take these calls seriously, and once officers respond, an arrest is often made even when both people say they do not want one and even when the story is far more complicated than the 911 call made it sound. Within hours you can be booked, barred from your own home by an emergency protective order, and separated from your children — all before you have spoken to a lawyer or a judge has heard a word of your side.

Boyadzhyan Legal Shield defends people accused of domestic violence throughout Los Angeles and the San Fernando Valley, from corporal injury under Penal Code § 273.5 to domestic battery under Penal Code § 243(e)(1) and the criminal threats, stalking, and protective-order charges that frequently accompany them. Founding attorney Knarik Boyadzhyan is a former Deputy Public Defender who began her career as a paralegal in the United States Department of Justice's Violent and Organized Crime Section. She has handled these cases from the inside — she knows how the prosecution builds them, and where they fall apart.

These cases are unusually dangerous precisely because they are unusually personal. They often rest on a single account given in the heat of an argument, sometimes shaped by a divorce, a custody dispute, jealousy, or a desire for the upper hand in a family court case. A conviction can bring jail, a mandatory 52-week batterer's intervention program (imposed when probation is granted), a lasting protective order, and a lifetime firearms ban — and, for non-citizens, it can mean deportation. Yet many of these charges are exaggerated, misremembered, or simply false.

From the first call, our job is to get ahead of the prosecution's timeline: address the protective order, protect your rights before charges are even filed where possible, investigate what actually happened, and pursue the outcome — a dismissal, a reduction, diversion, or an acquittal — that keeps your record, your freedom, and your family intact.

“Domestic violence” is not a single crime — it is a category of conduct defined by the relationship between the people involved. Penal Code § 13700 defines it as abuse committed against an intimate partner, and it is the relationship, not just the act, that turns an ordinary battery into a domestic violence case with all of the enhanced consequences that follow.

Under § 13700, an intimate partner includes a current or former spouse, a current or former fiancé(e), a current or former cohabitant, a person you are or were dating, and the other parent of your child. The conduct covered ranges from actually causing injury to placing someone in reasonable fear of imminent serious harm — which is why threats and intimidation, not just physical contact, can be charged as domestic violence. A related definition in the Family Code governs restraining orders and reaches an even broader circle of family and household members.

Because the relationship is doing so much of the work, the same push or grab that would be a simple misdemeanor between strangers becomes a charge that can carry a mandatory year-long counseling program, a protective order, and a firearms ban when it happens between partners. Understanding exactly which relationship and which statute the prosecution is relying on is the starting point of every defense we build.

Most domestic violence charges are “wobblers,” meaning the prosecutor can file them as either a misdemeanor or a felony depending on the alleged injury, any prior record, and the facts of the incident. Domestic battery under § 243(e)(1) is a straight misdemeanor carrying up to a year in county jail and a fine, while corporal injury under § 273.5 is a wobbler — as a misdemeanor it carries up to a year, and as a felony it can carry a state-prison term. How the case is charged is often the whole ballgame, and it is frequently negotiable.

Almost any domestic violence conviction that includes a grant of probation triggers Penal Code § 1203.097, which imposes a mandatory minimum three-year probation term and a mandatory 52-week batterer's intervention program — a full year of weekly classes at your own expense — along with protective-order terms, a fee, and often community service. These are statutory requirements the judge cannot simply waive, which is why the goal in many cases is to avoid a qualifying conviction altogether.

The most serious exposure comes from “strike” consequences. Where a felony corporal-injury charge involves great bodily injury, or where an accompanying criminal-threats or other charge qualifies, a conviction can count as a strike under California's Three Strikes law — doubling the sentence on any future felony and carrying lifelong weight. Add the collateral consequences below — firearms, immigration, custody, and professional licensing — and it becomes clear why these cases must be taken seriously from the first day.

A domestic violence arrest almost always comes with a protective order, and there are several kinds. An Emergency Protective Order (EPO) is issued on the spot, often at the officer's request by an on-call judge, and typically lasts up to about a week — it can order you out of your home and bar all contact before you have ever seen a courtroom. It is designed to cover the gap until longer-term orders can be considered.

A Domestic Violence Restraining Order (DVRO) is a civil order the alleged victim can seek in family court, and it can last for years. A Criminal Protective Order (CPO) is issued by the criminal court as a condition of your case and generally stays in force while the case is pending and after any conviction. These orders commonly prohibit contact, require you to stay a set distance away, remove you from a shared residence, restrict custody and visitation, and order you to surrender any firearms.

Two points are critical. First, a protective order is issued on a much lower standard of proof than a criminal conviction, so one can be in place against you even in a weak case. Second, violating any of these orders — even by responding to a text the other person sent you — is a separate crime under § 273.6 that can put you back in custody. We appear at the protective-order hearings, fight overbroad terms (particularly move-out and custody provisions), and make sure you understand exactly what the order forbids so a defensible case is not lost to an avoidable violation.

A charge is not a conviction, and in the right case California law offers paths that can end with the charges dismissed and no conviction on your record — an area that is easy to overlook. Which path fits depends on the facts, your history, and the court, and eligibility is never automatic, but these programs are frequently the difference between a clean record and a lifetime consequence.

One important limit to know at the outset: general judicial (misdemeanor) diversion under Penal Code § 1001.95 is not available for domestic-violence charges — the statute expressly excludes offenses involving domestic violence. That makes the treatment-based diversion programs below, and the strategy of avoiding a qualifying conviction in the first place, all the more important.

Mental health diversion under Penal Code § 1001.36 can apply where a qualifying mental health condition (such as PTSD, depression, or bipolar disorder) played a role in the offense; on successful completion of treatment, the charges are dismissed and the arrest is generally deemed never to have occurred. Military diversion under Penal Code § 1001.80 offers a similar treatment-based path for active-duty service members and veterans dealing with service-related conditions. We evaluate every one of these avenues at the outset, because the earlier a diversion strategy is built, the more likely it is to succeed.

The sentence a judge announces is often not the most damaging part of a domestic violence conviction. Firearms are the clearest example: under California law a conviction — and frequently a protective order by itself — strips your right to own or possess a gun, and the federal Lautenberg Amendment imposes a lifetime federal ban on firearm possession for anyone convicted of a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence. That federal ban reaches even minor misdemeanors and applies regardless of what state law says.

For non-citizens the stakes are extraordinary. A domestic violence conviction is a deportable offense under federal immigration law, and many of these charges are treated as crimes involving moral turpitude (CIMT) or as violations of a protective order — either of which can trigger removal, block a green card, or bar naturalization. If you are not a U.S. citizen, the immigration consequence can dwarf the criminal one, and the defense must be built around it from the start. This is general information, not immigration advice, and serious cases warrant coordinated criminal-immigration counsel.

The consequences continue into the rest of your life. A domestic violence finding can be decisive in a child custody dispute — Family Code presumptions can weigh against custody for a parent found to have committed domestic violence — which is one reason false allegations surface so often in divorces. And a conviction can jeopardize a professional license: nurses, teachers, contractors, real estate agents, and others licensed by the state can face discipline or revocation before their licensing board under the Business and Professions Code. We weigh all of it when we chart the defense, because protecting your record is protecting your livelihood and your family.

Boyadzhyan Legal Shield is based in Encino on Ventura Boulevard and defends domestic violence cases throughout the San Fernando Valley and greater Los Angeles — Sherman Oaks, Tarzana, Van Nuys, Woodland Hills, Studio City, Northridge, and the surrounding communities.

If you were arrested anywhere in the Valley, your domestic violence case is very likely to be prosecuted at the Van Nuys Courthouse, which handles criminal matters for the San Fernando Valley, while any related restraining-order proceedings may be heard in the Valley's family courts. Knowing the local court — its prosecutors, its judges, how the City Attorney and District Attorney actually resolve these cases, and which diversion arguments land in that courthouse — is an advantage a downtown-only or out-of-area firm cannot offer.

We appear in Van Nuys and the surrounding Los Angeles County courts regularly, and we move quickly: on many domestic violence matters the most important work happens in the first days, addressing the emergency protective order and, where charges have not yet been filed, engaging the prosecutor before a decision is made. If you or a loved one has been arrested, call us before you say anything to anyone.