First of all, how do you know he doesn't have a weapon?chuck-texas wrote:Thank you for your replies and thanks for your welcomes. What you guys said actually is almost what I thought, but what I am picturing in my mind is a bit different I guess. So, allow me to hypothesize a case, so that I can understand how this would work:
Say there was a very minor bumper-to-bumper accident, nothing serious happened. But the other person got really mad at you. He is not cooling down and he started to push you around. Like you know, poking and yelling at your face, etc. And he does not seem to cool down. However, use of force seems unnecessary, since he does not have a firearm or a knife or something, but he is pushing you around. He is not punching or anything, but you know, terribly angry and you cannot even call cops because of his temper.
What would you do in such a case? In the meantime, I will refresh my memory about the laws.
As for "poking", that's assault. PC 22.01 (a)(3):
"A person commits an offense if the person:
...
intentionally or knowingly causes physical contact with another when the person knows or should reasonably believe that the other will regard the contact as offensive or provocative."
Depending on the situation, they might get a squirt of pepper spray.