SAN FRANCISCO—On Wednesday, September 3, 2023, in a ruling by San Francisco Superior Court Judge Simon Frankel, he granted a motion to reduce the original charge to Penal Code section 17(b) motion. Frankel reduced a felony assault charge to a misdemeanor charge for an elderly woman with limited mobility issues, who stood accused under Penal Code section 245(a)(1), charged with assault with a weapon.
Frankel’s reasoning behind the reduced charge was the elderly woman’s lack of serious criminal offenses since 1995, her age, health and the nature of the offense, which is serious but not as serious as it may seem
The District Attorney Office begged to differ. Assistant District Attorney Elliot Brooks said that the woman had been apprehended many times for battery with violence since 2019.
In this particular case, the woman was going along the streets of San Francisco when someone accidentally spilled hot coffee on her, causing her to be burned. This was when she became physically aggressive. This woman did not seem to show any sort of responsibility for her any of her actions. If she gets the 17(b) motion, Brooks suggested to Frankel that she gets a one-year probation and a stay-away order to be included in the 17(b) motion. Because of this incident, she has become homeless, so she realizes the seriousness of her crime. Her defense lawyer said that she has not been in trouble with the law for four months.
The judge declined Brook’s additions to 17(b). The elderly woman will have a scheduled hearing as of Wednesday, September 17, 2025.
