Both spouses described a physical confrontation, but they disagreed about who struck first before an ear injury sent the husband to a hospital.
DEERFIELD BEACH, Fla. — The husband said his wife attacked him without being struck first. His wife said he hit her before she fought back. By the time a Florida Highway Patrol trooper began sorting through the competing accounts, the husband was in an emergency room and Amy Arlene Baker had acknowledged biting his ear during their drive on Interstate 95.
The competing versions are central to an Aug. 15 domestic violence case that resulted in Baker, 43, of Boca Raton, being charged with aggravated battery causing bodily harm or disability and two counts of child neglect without great bodily harm. Investigators said the couple’s children, ages 1 and 7, were in the vehicle throughout the confrontation. A trooper ultimately designated Baker as the primary aggressor, arrested her and notified the Florida Department of Children and Families.
Baker’s interaction with authorities began before the hospital interviews, according to the arrest report. She told investigators that she had called 911 because she believed her husband had been drinking. She said they were arguing about matters that included life insurance, liability and other personal issues while returning from a boat gathering in Fort Lauderdale. Baker alleged that her husband struck the left side of her face with an open hand while he was behind the wheel. The public reports reviewed do not describe an independent witness confirming that allegation.
Her husband disputed that account. He told the trooper that Baker had been insulting him while he drove north on I-95 near Hillsboro Boulevard in Deerfield Beach. He said he responded to one of her remarks by asking about a prior felony. According to his statement, Baker then slapped the left side of his face. He maintained that he never touched or struck her during the argument. The arrest report presents those statements as competing claims rather than a judicial finding about precisely how the confrontation started.
The two versions become less divided when they reach the act that caused the most serious injury. The husband said Baker grabbed his head and face with both hands and bit into his right ear, tearing away a portion. Baker also told investigators that she grabbed him and bit his ear, according to the report. She acknowledged causing a piece of the ear to become detached. That admission, along with the injury observed later at the hospital, gave investigators evidence beyond the spouses’ disagreement over who initiated the physical contact.
Baker reportedly told authorities that she had become frustrated and “lost control.” She said she had not experienced a previous argument that turned physically violent, and she told the trooper she later apologized and tried to help her husband. She also recovered the detached portion of his ear and brought it to medical personnel, according to investigators. Her husband’s account included a sharply different description of her immediate reaction: He said she laughed after the injury and initially did not seem to treat its seriousness appropriately.
The husband drove himself to West Boca Medical Center after realizing the extent of the injury, investigators said. A trooper who arrived there described him in the arrest report as lying in an emergency room bed with a bandage around his head and signs of bleeding on his neck and clothing. He was awaiting surgery intended to reattach the detached piece when the investigating trooper left. The sources reviewed do not provide a later medical update showing whether the procedure succeeded or whether the injury caused permanent impairment.
Meanwhile, the couple’s two children had been removed from the immediate situation without being reported physically injured. Friends who had been traveling behind the family from the Fort Lauderdale gathering took the children to a home after the family reached the hospital. Their presence in the vehicle became the basis for two additional criminal allegations against Baker. Investigators alleged that engaging in the violent confrontation while the children were passengers constituted child neglect even though the children themselves were not reported to have been struck.
Florida’s child-neglect law allows a neglect allegation to arise from a single incident when willful conduct or culpable negligence creates the type of danger covered by the statute. The provision under which Baker was booked, neglect without great bodily harm, is a third-degree felony. State law classifies aggravated battery causing great bodily harm, permanent disability or permanent disfigurement as a second-degree felony. Those statutory classifications describe the offenses charged; they do not establish that Baker committed them.
The trooper’s primary-aggressor determination moved the case from conflicting statements to an arrest. Baker was taken into custody that night and booked into the Broward County Jail. A magistrate later found probable cause for the charges, according to court information cited by Law&Crime. A probable cause finding permits a case to proceed at that stage but is not a determination of guilt. Baker later posted bond and was released from custody.
The court also limited contact between Baker and her husband after her release. According to the court information reported by Law&Crime, she was ordered not to contact him except when communication was necessary for arranging the care and custody of their children. That exception reflects the family circumstances surrounding the criminal case but does not resolve any separate custody or child-welfare questions. Public reports reviewed for this article do not describe a later Department of Children and Families decision.
Several facts in the investigation are therefore documented without resolving the central dispute. The couple was traveling north on I-95 with their children. An argument occurred. Baker acknowledged biting her husband’s ear and acknowledged that a portion became detached. The husband required emergency treatment. What remains disputed in the public record is whether he struck Baker before she bit him, as she alleged, or whether she alone initiated physical violence, as he alleged. The trooper’s arrest decision favored the husband’s account for purposes of identifying a primary aggressor, but the ultimate legal assessment belongs to the courts.
No later public report located through Sept. 28 established a final disposition of the charges. The available records reviewed do not show a reported conviction, acquittal or dismissal, and they do not disclose whether prosecutors or defense attorneys later developed additional evidence about the couple’s competing accounts. Baker remains entitled to the presumption of innocence as the allegations move through the legal process.
Author note: Last updated Sept. 28, 2026.