How Are Crimes Classified? Felonies, Misdemeanors, Infractions

Crimes in the United States are classified along several axes at once. The main one is severity: felonies carry more than a year of imprisonment, misdemeanors up to a year in jail, and infractions only a fine.¹ From there, classification also turns on the mental state the prosecution has to prove, the kind of harm the offense causes, and whether the case belongs in state or federal court. Each of those layers changes how a case is charged, where it is heard, and what happens to the defendant afterward.

Severity: Felony, Misdemeanor, or Infraction

Severity is the classification that controls sentencing range. Federal law lays out a detailed ladder, and most state codes follow a similar structure.

Felonies

A felony is any offense punishable by more than one year of imprisonment. Federal law divides felonies into five classes based on the maximum sentence:

Class A: life imprisonment or death
Class B: 25 years or more
Class C: 10 to less than 25 years
Class D: 5 to less than 10 years
Class E: more than 1 year but less than 5 years¹

Within a class, judges have discretion to impose shorter terms based on the facts. Many states further subdivide felonies by degree. First-degree offenses are the most serious and typically require proof of deliberate intent or premeditation. Second-degree offenses involve intentional conduct without the same level of planning. Third-degree felonies cover the least serious conduct that still crosses the felony threshold. Degree directly affects the sentencing ceiling.

A felony conviction does more than fix a sentence. Federal law prohibits anyone convicted of a crime punishable by more than one year of imprisonment from possessing a firearm.² Voting rights are restricted in most states, though the details vary: three jurisdictions never revoke voting rights, 23 states restore them automatically upon release from incarceration, 15 states require completion of parole or probation first, and 10 states impose indefinite restrictions or require a governor’s pardon for certain offenses.³

Misdemeanors

Misdemeanors are criminal offenses that can result in jail time, but less than a felony. Federal law breaks them into classes too:

Class A: more than six months but not more than one year
Class B: more than 30 days but not more than six months
Class C: more than five days but not more than 30 days¹

Sentences are served in a local or county jail rather than a state or federal prison. Fines, probation, community service, and restitution are common additions. A misdemeanor still creates a criminal record that can affect employment, housing, and professional licensing.

Infractions

Infractions sit at the bottom. Federal law defines an infraction as an offense carrying five days or less of imprisonment, or no imprisonment at all.¹ In practice, most infractions are punished only with a fine. Speeding tickets, jaywalking, and minor municipal code violations are typical examples. Infractions generally do not produce a criminal record and do not carry the collateral consequences that follow misdemeanor or felony convictions.

Wobbler Offenses

Some crimes do not fit neatly on either side of the felony-misdemeanor line. A wobbler is an offense a prosecutor can charge as either, depending on the circumstances. Factors that push a wobbler toward a felony charge include the defendant’s prior criminal history, the dollar amount of financial loss, whether the conduct involved a breach of trust, and how long the criminal activity continued. Fraud, embezzlement, and forgery are common wobblers. In many states, a defendant convicted of a wobbler felony can later petition the court to reduce it to a misdemeanor.

Criminal Intent

Severity tells you the ceiling on punishment. Intent tells you what the government has to prove about the defendant’s state of mind. Almost every criminal statute demands some level of mental culpability, what lawyers call mens rea. Causing harm accidentally is treated differently from causing it on purpose.⁴

The widely used framework breaks intent into four levels, from most to least culpable:

Purpose. The defendant consciously intended to cause the specific result. The highest bar for prosecutors.
Knowledge. The defendant did not necessarily aim for the result but was aware it was practically certain to happen.
Recklessness. The defendant knew about a serious risk and chose to ignore it.
Negligence. The defendant should have recognized the risk but did not. The difference from recklessness is awareness.⁴

The level of intent required is written into the statute defining the crime. A first-degree murder charge requires purpose or premeditation. A manslaughter charge for the same killing may require only recklessness or negligence. Same result, different mental state, very different sentence.

Strict Liability

A small category of crimes requires no proof of intent at all. Strict liability offenses hold a person responsible simply for committing the act, regardless of what they knew or intended. Most are minor, but a few serious crimes fall here, most notably statutory rape, where a defendant’s belief about the victim’s age is irrelevant.⁵ Drug possession is another common example.

What the Crime Targets

Criminal codes also group offenses by the type of interest they harm. This is how statutes are organized within a code, and it lines up loosely with severity.

Crimes Against Persons

These offenses involve direct physical harm or the threat of harm to another person. Homicide, assault, kidnapping, and sexual offenses all sit here, and they tend to carry the heaviest penalties. This category also includes the felony murder rule, which allows a murder charge against anyone involved in committing a violent felony if someone dies during the crime, even if the defendant did not intend a killing.⁶ Most states and federal law apply some version of the rule.

Crimes Against Property

Property crimes target belongings and assets rather than people. Theft, burglary, vandalism, and arson are the core offenses. Penalties scale with the value of the property involved. Most states set a dollar threshold, commonly between $750 and $2,500 depending on the state, above which a theft jumps from a misdemeanor to a felony. Arson is treated as a felony regardless of the value destroyed because fire threatens life.

White-Collar Crimes

White-collar offenses are financially motivated, non-violent crimes involving fraud, deception, or abuse of a position of authority. Wire fraud, mail fraud, securities fraud, bank fraud, and money laundering are the major federal examples. Wire fraud alone carries up to 20 years in prison, and that ceiling rises to 30 years if the scheme targets a financial institution.⁷ The label suggests something lighter than it is; federal sentences in these cases routinely reach decades.

Crimes Against Public Order

These offenses harm the community’s collective well-being rather than a specific victim. Drug offenses, disorderly conduct, public intoxication, and illegal gambling are common examples. Drug offenses in particular can carry severe penalties and often trigger mandatory minimum sentences at the federal level.

Federal vs. State Crimes

The vast majority of criminal cases are prosecuted in state courts. The jurisdictional split determines which court system handles the case, which rules of procedure apply, and often how severe the sentence will be.

Most everyday offenses, including assault, theft, drunk driving, and murder, are defined and prosecuted under state law. Each state maintains its own criminal code, its own grading system, and its own sentencing ranges. The same conduct can carry different penalties depending on where it happens. Local police and county sheriffs investigate these cases, and they are tried in state courts.

Federal jurisdiction applies when an offense violates a federal statute, crosses state lines, occurs on federal property, or affects a national interest like the banking system or immigration enforcement. Agencies like the FBI and DEA handle the investigations, and the cases go to federal district courts. Federal sentences can be more severe than their state equivalents, partly because federal law includes mandatory minimum sentences for certain categories, particularly drug trafficking and firearms offenses.

Federal courts operate under the Federal Sentencing Guidelines, which provide a structured framework for calculating sentences based on the offense level and the defendant’s criminal history. Since 2005, these guidelines have been advisory rather than mandatory; judges must consider them but can depart from the recommended range if they explain their reasoning.⁸ Most federal sentences still fall within the guideline range.

A single act can violate both state and federal law. Under the dual sovereignty doctrine, a person can be prosecuted in both systems for the same conduct without triggering double jeopardy protections. Federal authorities sometimes step in when they believe state charges are inadequate, or when a case involves conduct spanning multiple states.

How Long Prosecutors Have to Charge

A statute of limitations sets a deadline for bringing charges. Once the clock runs out, prosecutors lose the ability to file, no matter how strong the evidence. The default federal deadline is five years from the date of the offense.⁹ State deadlines vary widely by offense type and jurisdiction.

Certain categories have no deadline at all. At the federal level, any offense punishable by death can be prosecuted at any time.¹⁰ Federal crimes involving sexual or physical abuse of a child can be prosecuted during the victim’s lifetime or for ten years after the offense, whichever is longer. Terrorism offenses that caused death or serious bodily injury also carry no time limit. Most states similarly eliminate or extend deadlines for murder and sexual offenses against children. Limitations periods can also be paused, or tolled, when the defendant is a fugitive or when the crime was concealed through fraud.

What a Classification Means Beyond the Sentence

The sentence written into a statute is only part of what a conviction costs. Collateral consequences are the legal restrictions that attach automatically to a conviction but are not part of what the judge imposes. They include barriers to employment, housing, public benefits, professional licensing, college financial aid, military service, and immigration status.¹¹ In a majority of states, a felony drug conviction triggers a lifetime ban on receiving certain public assistance benefits. Roughly 87% of employers run background checks, and about 60% of formerly incarcerated people remain unemployed a year after release.¹²

These consequences often hit harder than the sentence itself, especially for misdemeanor convictions where the jail time was short but the criminal record lingers for decades. Expungement offers a path to clearing a record in some circumstances, though eligibility varies dramatically by state. Most states allow expungement for misdemeanors and some lower-level felonies, but serious violent offenses, sex crimes, and arson are almost universally excluded. Qualifying generally requires completing the full sentence including probation, paying all fines and court costs, and waiting a specified period without additional criminal activity.

1
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 3559 – Sentencing Classification of Offenses
2
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 922 – Unlawful Acts
3
National Conference of State Legislatures. Restoration of Voting Rights for Felons
4
Library of Congress, Congressional Research Service. Mens Rea – An Overview of State-of-Mind Requirements for Federal Criminal Law
5
Legal Information Institute. Strict Liability
6
Legal Information Institute. Felony Murder Rule
7
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 1343 – Fraud by Wire, Radio, or Television
8
Legal Information Institute. Federal Sentencing Guidelines
9
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 3282 – Offenses Not Capital
10
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 3281 – Capital Offenses
11
U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. Collateral Consequences – The Crossroads of Punishment, Redemption, and the Effects on Communities
12
Office of Justice Programs. Collateral Consequences of Criminal Convictions Judicial Bench Book