Our firm has handled numerous assault and battery cases, ranging from a cab driver attacked by a customer in a convenience store, a bar patron cut with a knife by another customer, wrongful use of force by private store managers, private security, and police officers. Both the law and society find it reprehensible for individuals to put their hands on another individual without their consent. While most cases of assault and battery involve personal injuries, an individual can be assaulted by a threat, coupled with an ability to harm. For example, if someone wrongfully points a gun at you and threatens you, you have been assaulted. Similarly, if they try unsuccessfully to run you over with their car, you have been assaulted.
Assault and battery can also include conduct of a sexual nature. We have represented a number of women who suffered battery of a sexual nature. See, Sex Abuse heading.
Below are some example cases we have handled:
Assault & Battery — Past Case Example #1
Rocky Tahara
Rocky Tahara: Verdict: $2,300,000. Battery. In a story right out of Marlon Brando’s On the Waterfront, Tahara was beaten nearly to death at the change of shift on the Honolulu docks for having exposed a system wherein workers connected to the union were paid for not working, a practice called “running away.” Rocky stood up for the workers who were forced to carry the load for those who were exploiting them. Oregon columnist Margie Boule proclaimed “Greg Kafoury and Mark McDougal have helped change a corrupt system on Honolulu’s waterfront.”
Assault & Battery — Past Case Example #2
Mark McDougal, Greg Kafoury and June Grittman
June Grittman: Verdict: $1,000,000. Battery by Automobile. Parking attendant at PDX Airport was rammed twice by a neurosurgeon who was upset at being ordered to move his car from a passenger loading area. She was left with permanent pain in her hip.
Assault & Battery — Past Case Example #3
David McKibben
Dave McKibben: Verdict: $600,000. Assault. Dave McKibben was going door to door in SE Portland for Greenpeace when he encountered William J. Schumacher, retired from Schumacher Fur Company. Schumacher berated and insulted McKibben, then followed him down the street and pointed a .357 Magnum pistol at him at close range. Schumacher fled only when witnesses appeared on the scene.
Assault & Battery — Past Case Example #4
Jennifer MacCrone
Jennifer MacCrone. Verdict: $1,525,000. On her first day on the job, Jennifer MacCrone was nearly killed by a violent resident at a home for developmentally disabled adults. Her supervisor lured her into thinking the residents were safe, when he knew full well that one of them had a history of outbursts of psychotic violence. After she managed to escape after being pinned down and nearly strangled to death, her supervisor blamed her for what had happened and told her she would never be able to work in the field again if she did not return and stay on the job that night. She developed PTSD, and her doctor told her she should hire a lawyer.
Assault & Battery — Past Case Example #5
Cab driver Eugene Stacy was having lunch at Plaid Pantry in the early hours of the morning as he worked the night shift. A man got into his car and demanded to be taken “down Union Avenue.” Stacy explained that he didn’t take people on trips if they did not have an address that they were going to, and, in any event, he was having his lunch. Angry, the man left. Shortly thereafter, Stacy went into the store to buy something more, and the man entered and confronted him. The man loudly exclaimed that he had just gotten out of the Oregon State Penitentiary, recited off his inmate number, and said, “I don’t mind hurting somebody else.” The 235 pound clerk later testified that the confrontation lasted some ten minutes before the stranger hit Stacy with a hard left hook, shattering Stacy’s jaw. The man then fled the scene. We sued Plaid Pantry based on the failure of the clerk to intervene, to call the police, or to even threaten to do so. During the clerk’s deposition, we learned that on his first day of the job, he had been given two baseball bats and an iron bar, and told that if anyone gave him any trouble, he was to “beat them and beat them and beat them.” The clerk explained that calling the police was not his job, and, in any event, he was not to leave his post since someone could reach into the till and take the money. The most money that was ever in the till was $25. Any amounts greater than that were immediately dropped into a lockbox. The jury awarded compensatory and punitive damages of $420,000.
Assault & Battery — Past Case Example #6
Dennis Sanderson, a homeless man, routinely searched for cans and bottles in Fraternity Row. Alpha Gamma Rho fraternity, an agricultural fraternity, whose members made a sport out of shooting homeless people with BB guns. However, one day, one of the fraternity members chose to use practice target ammunition and a .22 caliber rifle to shoot at Dennis Sanderson.