Assault and Battery With No Police Follow Up

[sethole]

My question involves criminal law for the state of: Pennsylvania.

My friend was out for the night, her boyfriend was home. She went to his house around midnight as she did on a regular basis. Cars were there, lights were on, doors unlocked. She went into the house, went upstairs, into his room, turned on the light, he was in bed with his ex-girlfriend. He goes crazy and starts to choke her, then the other girl, then starts pushing my friend and did so hard she flew down the hall, landed, and broke both wrists, one in three places requiring surgery this week. Also multiple bruises including finger marks on her arms. She's unable to drive, work, etc.

The cops came to the ER later the night of the incident. They took her statement. The cop told her to follow up once she knew the extent of her injuries. She has called back (it's now 6 days later) and the cop is on vacation and no one else will talk to her. She doesn't know if any charges have been filed.

What else should she be doing? She is going to file a Protection From Abuse order tomorrow.

Is she at risk since she went into his home and this happened?

Thanks for any input. She's never been through anything like this before.

Sharon

[aardvarc]

Since she didn't live there, if he argues that she typically didn't just walk in (ie that she usually knocked, didn't have a key, he wasn't expecting her to suddenly be IN his home in the middle of the night, etc.), then that could be problematic - his defense will probably be that she committed a home invasion, that he felt threatened (not saying she DID threaten or start it, only that it's a reasonable thing for him to say). There are a lot of different ways this could play out, and without hearing BOTH sides of the story, anything we'd tell you would be pure speculation. She can certainly try for a restraining order, but if the court feels that SHE entered and started the incident, then her arguement that she's afraid of HIM looses water quickly (and in fact would be more likely to result in an order against HER, if HE chose to seek one).