Black’s Law Dictionary defines “domestic violence” as “violence between members of a household.” Domestic violence laws synthesize various areas of criminal law into one category. This category of prohibited acts focuses on the relationship between the aggressor and the victim.
To trigger Nevada’s domestic violence laws, the victim or complainant must be the aggressor’s spouse, former spouse, a person to whom the victim is related by blood or marriage, a person with whom the victim is or was living with, a person with whom the victim has had or is having a dating relationship, a person with whom the victim has a child in common, the minor child of any of the above persons, the person’s minor child or any other person who has been appointed the custodian or legal guardian for the person’s minor child.
So long as any one of the above relationships exists, all of the following acts will constitute domestic violence:
- battery;
- assault;
- compelling the other person by force or threat of force to perform an act from which the other person has the right to refrain or to refrain from an act which the other person has the right to perform;
- sexual assault;
- a knowing, purposeful or reckless course of conduct intended to harass the other person. Such conduct may include, but is not limited to:
- stalking;
- arson;
- trespassing;
- larceny;
- destruction of private property;
- carrying a concealed weapon without a permit; and/or
- injuring or killing an animal.
- a false imprisonment; or
- an unlawful entering of the other victim’s residence, or forcible entry against the victim’s will if there is a reasonably foreseeable risk of harm to the victim from the entry.