Since I started taking my Justice and Law class this year, I've noticed that many people have certain misconceptions about laws. All fifteen of the students, myself included, were confused about the definitions of two crimes in particular: assault and battery. So, here's an informational primer.
Let's start with assault. The crime of assault can consist of attempted battery (we'll get to that later) and/or the intentional frightening of another person. You read right; frightening someone CAN be a crime, if that person was frightened and was anticipating bodily harm. This criterion is in place in order to protect people from random threats. For example, if someone walked up to you on the street, pulled out a gun, pointed it at you, and said something along the lines of "take one more step and I'll shoot you," that person would be guilty of assault, whether or not you were harmed. If you received injury, then the perpetrator would also be guilty of battery.
Battery is the crime that most people think is actually assault. Battery is, in fact, an unlawful application of force to another person. That applied force does not have to be direct physical touch, as in a punch or a kick; if someone were to throw a projectile, like a rock, very hard at someone and injure him/her, the thrower would have committed battery. The intent to cause harm to someone is not a stipulation of the crime of battery; regardless of whether harm was meant or not, battery has occurred.
As far as I know, both of these crimes are, in their simplest forms, misdemeanors. There are, however, sub-categories of these crimes that rise to the level of felonies. An example is aggravated assault, which is assault with a deadly weapon.
So, now you are one of the few people in our society who knows the difference between assault and battery.
