We have a juvenile case where one of five juveniles, during an attempted escape, swung a full, hard plastic, two gallon water jug at the back of the detention officer's head. The officer ducked thereby only being struck on the shoulder. Has anyone demonstrated in court the potential damage a full water jug can cause. I am seeking transfer to District Court and I am looking for ideas to use in Court.

How about having your police officer video a test wherein the hard plastic jug is swung against various items, so that the video demonstrates the impact of the item. Maybe a 1" pine board about 4 feet long perhaps? Then you could have some demonstrative evidence in the event the bottle breaks the board, which I would think is very possible.

Or contact your ME or a friendly doctor and ask him what kind of damage such an object could do if it collided with the back of a human head or the upper portion of the spine.

A gallon of fresh water weighs 8.34 pounds. Be sure the jury understands the jug weighed at least 16.68 lbs. if full. That's about a half pound more than the biggest bowling ball.

I really like the idea of showing other things that weigh an equivelent amount.

Use a burlap sack full of:

- Shot Put balls?

- Bricks?

- Soda Cans?

- frogs? (deady weapon notice required?)

- dumbbells?

- 99 cent value menu items at Wendy's?

I had a case in Fort Worth involving a teenager (adult) throwing a gallon water jug from the back of a truck at a couple of bicyclists headed towards him. In that case, the water was frozen, and they were drinking it as it melted.

Fortunately it bounced in front of them and one only required surgery involving a plate, a bolt, and six screws to put his femur back together while the second guy suffered from chronic back pain after the wipeout. We used the bowling example.

However my doctor was prepared to testify about the degree of trauma the ice block would have caused had it struck either man. Short version is they would probably not been available to testify. A full jug, especially closed, is very likely to survive an impact without breaking, and cause a lot of damage in the process. I like the video tape idea - I bet you could get a plea after showing it to the defense (or decide the case is way to good to plea out).

In my case the guy plead to pen time.