Criminal Jury Instructions for the District of Columbia
IV. Offenses
Scope
A. Crimes Against Persons
1. Assault and Threats

Instruction 4.105 MALICIOUS DISFIGUREMENT

D.C. Official Code § 22-406 (2001)

The elements of the offense of malicious disfigurement, each of which the government must prove beyond a reasonable doubt, are that:

1. [Name of defendant] inflicted an injury on [name of complainant];
2. [Name of defendant] acted voluntarily, on purpose, and not by mistake or accident;
3. At the time [name of defendant] inflicted the injury, s/he intended to disfigure [name of complainant]; [and]
4. As a result of the injury, [name of complainant] was permanently disfigured[.] [; and]
[5. There were no mitigating circumstances.]

“Disfigure” means to make less complete, perfect or beautiful in appearance or character. A person is permanently disfigured if s/he is appreciably less attractive or if a part of his/her body is to some appreciable degree less useful or functional than it was before the injury.

[Mitigating circumstances [can exist in two situations. One situation is] [occur] when a person acts in the heat of passion caused by adequate provocation. Heat of passion includes such emotions as rage, resentment, anger, terror and fear. Adequate provocation is conduct on the part of others that would cause an ordinary, reasonable person in the heat of the moment to lose his/her self-control and act on impulse and without reflection. For a provocation to be considered “adequate,” the person’s response must not be entirely out of proportion to the seriousness of the provocation. An act of violence or an immediate threat of violence may be adequate provocation, but mere words, no matter how offensive, are never adequate provocation. [The provocation must be such as would provoke a reasonable sober person. Therefore, if a person was provoked simply because s/he was intoxicated, and a sober person would not have been provoked, the provocation would not be considered as “adequate.”]]

[Mitigating circumstances also occur when a person actually believes that s/he is in danger of serious bodily injury, and actually believes that the use of force that was intended to cause disfigurement was necessary to defend against that danger, but one or both of those beliefs are not reasonable. [Thus, mitigating circumstances are similar to self-defense, which is a complete defense to the charges, but different in that self-defense requires that a person’s actual beliefs about both the danger and the need to respond to it be reasonable.]

To prove malicious disfigurement, the government must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that there were no mitigating circumstances. [If it does not, you must find [name of defendant] not guilty of malicious disfigurement and go on to consider whether the government has proved him/her guilty of [aggravated assault] [assault with significant injury] [assault with a dangerous weapon] [assault].]

[If an age enhancement was charged, insert Sentencing Enhancement Based on Age, No. 8.103.]

 

[230728]