A 45-year-old Brockton woman is facing four felony counts after police say she pepper-sprayed her neighbor and the neighbor's three children during a confrontation at a Walnut Avenue apartment, including one child just 4 years old who was rushed to the hospital. The woman told officers she was defending herself, citing a prior dispute with her neighbor that the neighbor denies ever happened.
Officers were dispatched to the apartment building on Walnut Avenue on August 11 for a welfare check, according to The Enterprise. Once there, police say the alleged victim reported that her neighbor had pepper-sprayed her and her children, including the 4-year-old, per the police report cited by the outlet. That child was transported to Boston Medical Center South for evaluation.
Inside the suspect's apartment, officers said they recovered the pepper spray along with a kitchen knife sitting on the counter and a set of brass knuckles, according to the police report. Police then took the woman into custody.
Self-Defense Claim Meets a Denial
The Brockton woman claimed she had acted in self-defense, telling officers the confrontation stemmed from a prior dispute with her neighbor, per the police report. The neighbor, however, denied that any such earlier dispute had taken place, leaving the two accounts of what led to the pepper-spraying in direct conflict.
Prosecutors charged the woman with one count of assault and battery with a dangerous weapon tied to the adult neighbor, plus three counts of the more serious assault and battery with a dangerous weapon on a child under 14 — one for each of the neighbor's children who were allegedly sprayed. Under Massachusetts General Law Chapter 265, Section 15A(c)(iv), each of those child-victim counts is an aggravated felony carrying up to 15 years in state prison and a fine of up to $10,000 for a defendant her age, according to a legal explainer from Urbelis Law. The single count involving the adult neighbor falls under the standard version of the statute, Section 15A(b), which caps punishment at up to 10 years in state prison or 2.5 years in a house of correction and a $5,000 fine, per Caselden Law.
Why Pepper Spray Counts as a Dangerous Weapon
Massachusetts law allows adults 18 and older to buy and carry pepper spray without a permit under General Law Chapter 140, Sections 121 and 122D. But state appellate courts have held that pepper spray can still be legally classified as a dangerous weapon in criminal prosecutions because of its capacity to cause severe incapacitation, according to legal background compiled by the Urban Firearm Society. That distinction is central to why a legally purchased item turned into the basis for felony charges rather than a lesser offense.
The brass knuckles police say they found in the apartment carry their own legal exposure independent of the pepper-spray allegations. Under General Law Chapter 269, Section 10(b), carrying metallic or brass knuckles outside one's home or business is illegal in Massachusetts, punishable by up to 2.5 years in a house of correction or as much as 5 years in state prison, per a breakdown from DeGiacomo & Mikhlin, P.C.
Self-Defense Claim Faces a Steep Legal Bar
Her self-defense claim will run into Massachusetts' strict duty-to-retreat standard. The Commonwealth is not a stand-your-ground state, and outside one's own home, the law generally requires a person to attempt to retreat by all reasonable means before using force, according to the Serpa Law Office. The state's Castle Doctrine, codified at Chapter 278, Section 8A, waives that retreat requirement only for lawful occupants confronting an unlawful intruder inside their own dwelling — a narrow exception that would not obviously apply to a hallway or common-area dispute between neighbors in the same building.
Arraignment and What Comes Next
The woman was arraigned in Brockton District Court on August 12, entering a plea of not guilty, according to court records. A judge ordered her held on $500 cash bail. In Massachusetts district courts, judges weigh factors like flight risk, prior record, and public safety when setting bail, and defendants can be released after posting the amount while remaining subject to conditions such as stay-away orders, per background from the Law Office of Joseph J. Yannetti. She is due back in Brockton District Court on September 9 for a pretrial hearing.
The case will move through the Plymouth County District Attorney's Office, led by District Attorney Timothy J. Cruz, which oversees felony prosecutions originating from Brockton police investigations and maintains a Child Witness to Violence initiative aimed at supporting children exposed to violent crime, according to the office's own materials.
Part of a Recurring Pattern in the Region
The felony enhancement applied here — assault and battery with a dangerous weapon on a child under 14 — has surfaced in other recent Massachusetts cases involving young bystanders caught up in adult conflicts. In June, Hoodline reported that Brockton police arrested a 17-year-old on the same charge after a dirt bike struck a 3-year-old at James Edgar Playground. And in May, prosecutors in East Boston brought an identical charge after a child was hit by broken fencing during a neighborhood dispute, a case Hoodline also covered. Plymouth County prosecutors have shown a pattern of applying the statutory enhancement whenever young children are exposed to dangerous items during adult altercations.
The 4-year-old was treated at Boston Medical Center South, a 224-bed acute care hospital in Brockton that was known as Good Samaritan Medical Center until the Boston Medical Center Health System acquired and renamed it in May 2025 following the bankruptcy of former owner Steward Health Care, according to reporting from CBS News.
