No Contact Order

[asucimim]

My question involves criminal law for the state of: Florida

My fiance and I got into an altercation last weekend, and I was arrested for
domestic battery with a no contact order for 30 days. I was guilty and spent 2 days is jail. It is a misdemeanor and I am on SOR until Oct. 24th when I go for an arraignment.

I lost my job over this ordeal but would really like to go home for the holidays.
Do I need an attorney?? What is the maximum penalty I face?

I had a felony and misdemeanor back in 1989 due to drugs but have been clean and sober since. This was totally unlike me and think I acted out under stress, etc. No excuse!!

[aardvarc]

The maximum penalty you face is being re-arrested and spending your holiday in jail, plus additional criminal charges, and all the costs and hassles associated thereto (for starters). No contact means just that: NO contact. You might ask your attorney if they can try to move up your arraignment date, but until and unless a JUDGE says otherwise, the order is in effect on holidays too and can be enforced by your friendly neighborhood law enforcment officers.

[asucimim]

Thanks...I understand that no contact means no contact. However, I can not find my actual charge of domestic battery in the FL statues. I see simple battery, domestic violence, etc. but not my specific charge. I was wondering what the max is on that charge as far as jail time/probabation, etc.

I have not obtained an attorney yet.

[aardvarc]

Yeah, the way things are written, it can be very confusing. In Florida, like most states, "domestic violence" isn't a term meaning a specific offense - instead, it can refer to a great number of other offenses/crimes such as strangulation, battery at all levels, assault at all levels, kidnapping, depriving of means to summon aid, etc. When one or more of these crimes occur between two persons who are living together, sleeping together, have children together, etc., they fall under the general umbrella of "domestics". The effect is, in a nutshell, to increase the level of the crime. So for example if slapping a stranger amounts to a second degree misdemeanor for battery, slapping a girlfriend gets "upped" to a first degree misdemeanor. If hitting and injuring a stranger fits the level of a first degree misdemeanor, the charge gets "upped" to a third degree felony. In your case, the crime itself by definition in statutes would be "battery"; since it has been called "domestic battery", that would indicate that the charge would be brought at the next higher level, and with the possibilities of the punishments available for that higher level. If you haven't already started looking for an attorney, now is the time. You could be looking at felony charges by the time your arraignment arrives.