18 USC 844: Explosives Penalties, Bomb Threats, and Arson

Penalties under 18 U.S.C. 844 run from a one-year maximum for minor regulatory lapses to death or life imprisonment when an explosion kills someone. The statute assigns punishment to each unlawful act defined in 18 U.S.C. 842 and creates standalone offenses of its own: destroying property with explosives, transporting them with intent to harm, using them during another federal crime, and making bomb threats. Which subsection applies decides everything, because the gap between a regulatory violation and a property-destruction charge is measured in decades.¹

How Section 844 Fits With Section 842

Section 842 lists what is illegal: possessing explosives without a license, distributing to prohibited persons, failing to keep records, transporting without documentation. Section 844 sets the punishment for each of those acts and adds its own offenses on top. Reading 844 without 842 next to it is difficult because the penalty subsections constantly point back at the conduct subsections.¹

Two broad categories run through the statute. One covers the regulatory framework: licensing, records, and distribution. The other covers the dangerous conduct: actually using explosives to destroy things, injure people, or facilitate other crimes. The dividing line matters more than any judge’s view of seriousness, because the subsection charged determines whether the exposure is measured in months or in decades.

Penalties for Regulatory Violations

Section 844(a) handles violations of the licensing, record-keeping, and distribution rules in section 842. Most carry a maximum of 10 years in prison, a fine, or both. That includes possessing explosives without a license, distributing to a prohibited person, and failing to comply with storage or documentation requirements.¹

Less serious regulatory violations — minor record-keeping failures that fall outside the core provisions — carry a maximum of one year and a fine. Which subsection of section 842 was violated decides where the line falls.¹

Stealing explosive materials from interstate commerce, or from a licensed manufacturer, importer, or dealer, is treated separately and carries up to 10 years.²

Penalties for Destroying Property With Explosives

The heaviest penalties in section 844 attach to using explosives to damage or destroy property. Two separate provisions cover this, split by the kind of property involved, but they share the same escalating structure.

Federal Property and Federally Funded Institutions

Damaging or destroying property owned by the United States, a federal agency, or an institution receiving federal funding carries a mandatory minimum of 5 years and a maximum of 20. If someone is injured or the conduct creates a substantial risk of injury, the range rises to 7 to 40 years. If anyone dies as a result, the penalty is either the death penalty or imprisonment for at least 20 years up to life.¹

Property Used in Interstate Commerce

Property used in interstate or foreign commerce follows the same tiered structure: 5 to 20 years for property damage alone, 7 to 40 years when someone is injured, and any term of years up to life, or the death penalty, when someone is killed. This is the provision that gives federal prosecutors reach into bombings and arson of private commercial property, not only government buildings.¹

Both provisions reach attempts. You do not have to succeed in destroying the property to face these penalties.

Transporting Explosives With Intent to Harm

Section 844(d) makes it a standalone offense to knowingly transport or receive explosives in interstate or foreign commerce with intent to injure people or destroy property. The base penalty is up to 10 years. If someone is injured, the maximum rises to 20 years. If anyone dies, the sentence can run to any term of years, life, or the death penalty.²

Even if the explosives are never detonated, moving them across state lines while knowing they will be used unlawfully triggers these penalties. The intent element separates this offense from ordinary transportation violations, which fall under the regulatory provisions at much lower exposure.

Using an Explosive During Another Federal Crime

Section 844(h) imposes a mandatory 10-year sentence on anyone who uses fire or an explosive to commit any federal felony, or who carries an explosive during a federal felony. The sentence is consecutive: it stacks on top of the underlying felony’s sentence, and a court cannot allow it to run concurrently. No probation is available, and the sentence cannot be suspended. A second conviction under this subsection doubles the consecutive term to 20 years.¹

Sentences compound quickly here. A defendant convicted of a federal drug trafficking offense carrying 10 years, who used an explosive during that crime, faces at minimum 20 years total, with no way to combine the terms.

Section 924(c) can also apply when the explosive qualifies as a “destructive device,” which federal law treats as a type of firearm. The 924(c) consequences are steeper: possessing a destructive device during a violent crime or drug trafficking offense triggers a mandatory minimum of 30 years, and a second offense carries mandatory life. Those terms are also consecutive to the underlying crime.³

People with three or more prior convictions for violent felonies or serious drug offenses face further enhancement under the Armed Career Criminal Act, which mandates a 15-year minimum.³

Bomb Threats and False Reports

You do not need to possess or use an explosive to be charged under section 844. Threatening to kill, injure, or destroy property using fire or an explosive, communicated by phone, mail, email, or any form of interstate communication, carries up to 10 years. The same 10-year maximum applies to anyone who knowingly conveys false information about an alleged bombing attempt.¹

The reach here is broader than many realize. A bomb threat called into a school, a false report of a device at an airport, or a threatening email can support federal prosecution as long as the communication crossed state lines or used an interstate communication method.

Failing to Report Theft or Loss

A licensee or permittee who knows that explosive materials have been stolen and does not report the theft within 24 hours faces up to five years in prison, a fine of up to $10,000, or both.¹ The 24-hour reporting duty runs through ATF’s toll-free hotline and a written report, and applies to carriers as well as licensees.⁴

How Long Prosecutors Have to Charge

Federal prosecutors have 10 years to bring charges for the most serious explosive offenses: arson under section 81, using explosives during a felony under section 844(h), and damaging property with explosives under sections 844(f) and 844(i). That extended window is set by 18 U.S.C. 3295 and doubles the standard five-year federal limitations period.⁵

Capital offenses, meaning those where a death resulted and the death penalty is a possible sentence, have no statute of limitations under federal law. Regulatory violations prosecuted under the lower-penalty provisions of section 844(a) and (b) follow the standard five-year period.

Where Federal Penalties Stop and Other Law Begins

Section 844 is not the only source of exposure in an explosives case. If the device qualifies as a “destructive device” under the National Firearms Act, possessing it without NFA registration is a separate federal offense carrying up to 10 years and a $10,000 fine on its own.⁶

Federal and state jurisdiction often overlap. Federal prosecutors typically handle cases involving interstate transportation, terrorism connections, or federal licensing violations. State authorities handle offenses grounded in state law, such as illegal fireworks possession or small-scale improvised devices, and states can impose penalties beyond what federal law requires. A single incident can produce charges under section 844, under 924(c) or the NFA, and under state law at the same time.

1
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 U.S.C. 844 – Penalties
2
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 U.S.C. 844 – Penalties
3
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 U.S.C. 924 – Penalties
4
eCFR. 27 CFR 555.30 – Reporting Theft or Loss of Explosive Materials
5
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 U.S.C. 3295 – Arson Offenses
6
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 U.S.C. 5871 – Penalties