Asked about 1 year ago - Seattle, WA
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In a general event where an argument over a parking spot thus a threat was uttered, an arrest, charge in Superior Court as a felony harassment then for what ever reason, lack of record, evidence, the case is now downgraded to District Court for a misdemeanor disorderly.
Now even that charge is going for an Alford plea because the alleged victim only wanted to have a [no contact order] not to necessarily bring charges.1. Is there a way to place a no contact order in a criminal case without a charge and 2. I know there will be a new charge in D C and Superior will dismiss subsequently, but when the lower court prosecutors file the charging doc(s) how can they go from say a "I'll blow your head off" to language in disorderly charge. Aren't the prosecutors then [inventing] a situation?
The threat was investigated initially as a felony. When the felony prosecutors declined to prosecute the case, it was sent down to district court to see if they wanted to prosecute the case as a misdemeanor. The misdemeanor prosecutor has decided to charge the person involved with disorderly conduct (words or actions that put someone in reasonable fear or apprehension of an assault).
An alford plea essentially is a guilty plea, but to answer your questions:
1. A no contact order must be connected to a criminal charge. Once the charge is dropped, or jurisdiction expires, the no-contact order goes away. If someone wants a protection order, or anti-harassment order, they can get that in CIVIL court without the criminal case happening.
2. When you say you are going to "blow someone's head off", the felony prosecutor must determine whether that reaches the level of felony harassment. They determined it did not meet those requirements. There is still misdemeanor harassment, and if the person was in reasonable fear that in fact their head was going to be blown off, then one could be convicted of that misdemeanor. Disorderly conduct is a lesser charge than that, with lesser penalties.
The prosecutors aren't really inventing a situation. Legislators write what the laws are, not prosecutors. The prosecutors might be cutting this person a break by charging disorderly instead of harassment, or they might think they can't prove the more serious crime (harassment)
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