Q: If someone is unconscious can they be criminally charged for assault?
This person was tazed during an arrest and was unconscious the officer called EMS to preform a sternum rub. While EMS worker was performing the sternum rub the person unconscious unintentionally head butted the EMS worker. The person that was tazed only remembered getting pulled over then tazed the next thing he remembers is that he was in jail.
A: The law requires the State to prove that the person charged "intentionally, knowingly, or recklessly causes bodily injury to another..." Based on what you have presented - it sounds like the State may have a difficult task of proving the required mens rea. This does not mean the the person cannot be charged with the offense - but getting beyond a reasonable doubt is another issue all together. So to specifically answer the question, yes, a person can be charged criminally if the state doesn't believe the person tazed was unconscious when he or she head butted the EMS worker.
Tim Akpinar and Kiele Linroth Pace agree with this answer
1 user found this answer helpful
A:
A person can be criminally CHARGED with head-butting the Tooth Fairy or Santa Clause or The Boogey Man but they probably won't be convicted of those things if they take a plea instead of taking it to trial with a good defense team.
If the person has a good defense team, they will have already filed written discovery requests for any BodyCam or DashCam recordings of the incident, the EMS dispatch report, and the disciplinary history for everyone involved.
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