Sexual Battery
Battery, broadly defined, is when one person intentionally touches another, without the victim’s consent, in a manner that is harmful or offensive.
Sexual battery is simply a sub-category of battery. It is any harmful or offensive contact with an “intimate part” of a person’s body, which usually includes the sexual organs, buttocks, and the female breasts.
In California, the sexual contact must take place while the victim is restrained by the perpetrator or an accomplice; it must be against the victim’s will, and for the purpose of sexual arousal, gratification, or abuse. It can be punished by up to 4 years in prison, and a fine of up to $10,000.
There are some exceptions to the requirement that the victim be physically restrained. If the victim is asleep, unconscious, immobile, or otherwise unable to give consent, any sexual contact with the victim is sexual battery.
For example, fondling a person while he or she is asleep constitutes sexual battery. Similar conduct against a person confined to a hospital bed would also constitute sexual battery.
It does not matter if the victim is incapacitated through their own conduct. For example, if a person gets drunk and passes out, any sexual contact with that person would be sexual battery.
Note that while almost any case of rape would meet the above elements of sexual battery (non-consensual sexual contact with a person who is restrained or incapacitated), it is treated as a separate, and more severe, crime.
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Last Modified: 01-03-2011 12:26 PM PST
