Did you know that you do not have to physically touch another individual in order to be charged with the offence of assault? Even if you were to give the other individual the belief that they were in imminent danger of being physically hurt, this would still come under the definition of a common assault and you could be charged accordingly.
Assault is a rather complex area of criminal law and you would always be able to gain a better understanding through professionals such as Hart Brown Surrey solicitors In this article we are going to take a very brief look at some of the other main definitions of assault.
To do this, we need to focus our attention on The Offences Against the Person Act 1861 - this century and a half old statute has furnished us with terms like ABH and GBH and most people often believe that these initials have only been conceived in modern times. This is not the case; as you can see, this statute received Royal Assent back in the mid-Victorian era.
Provided there was no real injury or harm incurred (usually just a slight bruising), the majority of assaults usually fall under section 47 of the Act. The more serious assaults will come under either sections 20 or 18.
When there was no intention to inflict grievous bodily harm, but serious injury had still transpired: this will fall under section 20. However, where an individual knowingly set out to inflict grievous harm to another - this comes under the most serious assault charge of them all (section 18) and the perpetrator could face a term of up to life imprisonment, if the intent can be proven.