By Jose Medina
MERCED – A Merced man more or less admitted he punched his wife—twice—but the injuries were not serious enough to be charged with a felony after a pretrial hearing in Merced County Superior Court.
According to a police report, on June 12, 2020, Shawn Haynee allegedly pushed his wife onto the couch and punched her two times after an earlier dispute, according to testimony last week at a preliminary hearing in Department 2,
Haynee is charged with domestic violence, violating Penal Code section 273.5 which outlines the offense as purposefully imposing violence or force upon one’s spouse, resulting in corporal injury.
The witnesses who testified were Deputy Cody Parks and Detective Michael Ramirez.
Deputy Parks was the witness who arrived at the incident scene and recorded the injuries sustained by Haynee’s wife. Detective Ramirez arrested Haynee at his work the next day of the incident.
According to Deputy Parks, Haynee’s wife told him that she and her spouse got into a dispute which began in their bedroom. Haynee’s wife later collected his backpack and wallet and threw them out of the house because she wanted him to leave. She also mentioned that she took money out of his wallet.
She told the deputy that her “spouse chased her back into the house and flipped over a table with a laptop on it, pushed her onto the couch, and punched her two times.” Deputy Parks also mentioned that the victim’s 18-year-old son overheard the argument and made his way over to pull Haynee off the victim. The son was not at the scene when Deputy Parks arrived.
Deputy Parks then recalled that the victim had redness on the right side of her cheek along with redness along her check. He also mentioned that she had scratches on her right forearm. Deputy Parks remembered “I touched the right side of her cheek, where the redness was, and asked her if she felt pain and she said no.”
Detective Ramirez described his experience arresting Haynee at his work. He mentioned that Haynee was being cooperative at his arrest, but when the detective asked Haynee about his spouse’s injuries, Haynee hastily answered, “If I’m going to jail so be it, let’s go! I don’t mind getting in trouble for something I do!”
The prosecution said Haynee has a Penal Code section 245(a)(1) violation from 2012. This violation outlines the offense as someone assaulting anyone with a deadly weapon, or using force to cause great bodily injury.
The defendant’s attorney asked the court to consider a Penal Code section 17(b) motion—reducing a felony to a misdemeanor—because the victim’s injuries did not casue bruising and medical service was not required. The defendant’s attorney also mentioned that the dispute began with the victim provoking the defendant by stealing his money.
Ultimately, the court granted the 17b motion, with Judge Jeanne Schechter ruling “the injuries are extremely minor although the defendant has a terrible background history and assaulting someone over money is terrible conduct—there’s just no serious injuries on the victim.”
The defendant will have another hearing on Monday, Sept. 14, to deal with the misdemeanor charge.
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