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"If two men get into a fight with each other, and the wife of one comes up to save her husband from his antagonist and puts out her hand and seizes him by his genitals, you shall cut off her hand; show no pity." Deuteronomy.25.11
IIRC, Rambam learns from that verse that an aggressor should be stopped by all means. But in this case, the woman is protecting her husband who's attacked by another man.
Why should be such a woman be stopped by cutting her hand off?
There are two ways of reading it halachically:
A.) She touches the other fellow inappropriately and has to pay for embarrassment, figuratively cutting off her hand. (This is Rashi's reading.)
B.) She is attempting to injure the fellow in a life-threatening way, and thus can be stopped even by literally cutting off her hand. This is Rambam's reading.
In either case, if she was truly acting to save her husband from what she believed to be a life-threatening attack, then yes, she'd be exempt. It appears the case is that they're just horsing around and the only thing at risk here is someone's ego. (Or alternatively, the fight is already over and she's now engaging.)
If I recall correctly, there is one midrash halacha that reads a slight twist on it: the woman's husband is guilty of a capital crime. And the man she is attacking here is the executioner, which she has no right to do.
