How Long Does the State Have to File Criminal Charges?

How long the state has to file criminal charges depends on the offense and where it happened. Most misdemeanors have to be charged within one to three years, most non-violent felonies within three to five, and the most serious crimes, including murder in every state, carry no deadline at all. Federal prosecutors generally have five years for any offense not punishable by death.¹

When the Clock Starts

For most offenses, the countdown begins on the date the crime was committed. One punch, one stolen item, one specific date on the calendar.

Financial crimes are the main exception. Some jurisdictions apply a “discovery rule” that delays the start of the clock until the crime is discovered or reasonably should have been. If an employee has been embezzling for three years before an audit catches it, the clock may start on the day the theft was uncovered rather than the day the first dollar went missing. Discovery rules show up most often in fraud, embezzlement, and other offenses where concealment is part of the crime itself.

Time Limits for Misdemeanors

For misdemeanors like petty theft or disorderly conduct, the statute of limitations in most states falls between one and three years. The majority land at one or two years. A handful of states allow longer: Alaska, Kansas, and New Jersey give prosecutors five years even for misdemeanor charges, and Massachusetts and Michigan allow six. At the short end, Louisiana gives just six months for offenses punishable only by a fine.²

Time Limits for Felonies

Non-violent felonies like grand theft or burglary typically carry a statute of limitations of three to five years across most states. Florida allows four years for first-degree felonies, New York and California set their general felony limits at five and three years respectively, and Arkansas uses three years as its baseline.²

For more serious felonies, the picture gets less predictable. Arson is a good illustration. Alabama, Illinois, Mississippi, Nebraska, and Rhode Island impose no statute of limitations on arson at all. Texas allows ten years, Vermont sets eleven, and Nevada gives prosecutors just four. Assault with a deadly weapon varies just as widely. Ohio allows twenty years for felonious assault, arson, robbery, and kidnapping.

The common assumption that violent felonies carry a neat seven-to-ten-year window doesn’t hold up when you compare states side by side. The only reliable way to know your exposure is to check the specific statute in the state where the alleged offense occurred.

Federal Filing Deadlines

Federal crimes follow a separate set of rules. The default statute of limitations for any federal offense not punishable by death is five years from the date of the crime.¹ That five-year clock applies to a wide range of offenses, from mail fraud to tax evasion to drug possession.

Congress has carved out longer windows for specific categories. Federal crimes involving the sexual or physical abuse of a child, or kidnapping of a child under 18, can be prosecuted during the life of the child or for ten years after the offense, whichever period is longer.³ Any federal offense punishable by death has no time limit at all.⁴

Crimes With No Filing Deadline

Murder is the most universally recognized crime with no statute of limitations. Every state and the federal system allow murder charges to be brought at any time, whether the killing happened last month or forty years ago.⁴

Beyond murder, many states have eliminated time limits for other serious offenses:

Sexual offenses against children. Nearly every state removes or dramatically extends the deadline for child sexual abuse. Some, like Alaska, apply this broadly to any sex crime committed against someone under 18.
Kidnapping. States including Alaska, Colorado, and Michigan allow prosecution at any time or impose extended windows of ten years or more.
Human trafficking and sex trafficking. An increasing number of states treat these as no-limit offenses.
Terrorism. Arizona, for example, lists terrorism among its no-limit crimes.
Arson and forgery. Several states, including Alabama, Colorado, Illinois, and Nebraska, impose no time limit on arson or forgery.

The trend over the past two decades has been to expand this list, particularly for crimes involving children.²

What Pauses the Clock

The statute of limitations can be paused under certain conditions, a concept called tolling. When the clock is tolled, it freezes and picks back up once the triggering condition ends. Time that passed before the pause still counts.

The most common reason for tolling is the suspect leaving the state. If someone commits a crime and then moves or flees, the clock generally stops for the entire period they are absent. Most states have explicit statutes providing that time spent outside the state doesn’t count toward the limitations period.

Crimes involving child victims often receive special treatment. Many states pause the statute until the victim reaches age 18 and then allow an additional window of years beyond that. At the federal level, prosecution for child sexual abuse, physical abuse, or kidnapping can proceed during the life of the child or for ten years after the offense.³

Other triggers that can pause the clock include pending requests for foreign evidence in federal cases, a suspect’s incarceration for another offense, or a formal agreement between the defendant and prosecutors to extend the filing window. Some states also toll the statute while a suspect is actively concealing their identity or the evidence of the crime.

DNA Evidence Can Suspend the Deadline

Advances in DNA technology have pushed legislatures to rethink rigid filing deadlines, especially for sexual assault. Roughly 27 states now have some form of DNA exception that suspends or eliminates the statute of limitations when biological evidence yields an unidentified DNA profile.⁵

If a rape kit or crime scene sample produces a DNA profile that doesn’t match anyone in existing databases, the statute of limitations freezes until the individual is identified. In some states, this suspension lasts indefinitely. Michigan’s law allows an indictment to be filed “at any time after the offense is committed” if the evidence contains DNA from an unidentified person.

A related development is the “John Doe” DNA warrant, where prosecutors file an arrest warrant identifying the suspect solely by their genetic profile. Courts, including the California Supreme Court, have ruled that this type of warrant satisfies the requirement that prosecution begin before the statute of limitations expires. Once the warrant is on file, the suspect can be prosecuted whenever their identity is eventually determined.

What Happens When the Deadline Passes

Once the statute of limitations expires, prosecutors can no longer bring charges for that offense. If charges have already been filed after the deadline, the case can be dismissed. But the expiration is an affirmative defense, not an automatic shield. A defendant has to raise it. Plead guilty or go to trial without ever arguing that the filing deadline passed, and you lose the defense entirely.⁶

The U.S. Supreme Court confirmed this in 2016, holding that the general five-year federal limitations period is not a jurisdictional requirement that courts enforce on their own. A defendant who fails to raise it at or before trial cannot bring it up for the first time on appeal. The same principle applies in most state courts. If you believe the filing deadline has passed, assert that defense early, ideally through a motion to dismiss before the case reaches a jury.

One nuance matters. The statute of limitations governs when charges are filed, not when the trial happens. Prosecutors satisfy the deadline by obtaining an indictment or filing an information within the limitations period. If the indictment is timely but the trial doesn’t occur until years later because of court backlogs or other delays, the statute of limitations is not a valid defense. The clock stops once the formal charge is on file.¹

1
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 3282 – Offenses Not Capital
2
Justia. Criminal Statutes of Limitations: 50-State Survey
3
Justia. 18 USC 3283 – Offenses Against Children
4
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 3281 – Capital Offenses
5
FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin. Statutes of Limitation in Sexual Assault Cases
6
Congress.gov. Statute of Limitation in Federal Criminal Cases: An Overview