Car Theft in Maryland: Statutes, Penalties, and Defenses

Car theft in Maryland can be charged several different ways, and the label the prosecutor picks controls the sentence. The core statute, Criminal Law Section 7-105, makes motor vehicle theft a felony carrying up to five years in prison and a $5,000 fine.¹ But the same act can also be charged as general theft, where penalties scale with the car’s value and often exceed five years; as unauthorized removal, a misdemeanor with a surprisingly long ceiling; or as carjacking, which reaches 30 years in state court and up to life in federal court. Which statute applies turns on how the vehicle was taken, what it was worth, and whether force was involved.

What Section 7-105 Actually Requires

Section 7-105 prohibits knowingly and willfully taking a motor vehicle out of the owner’s lawful custody, control, or use without consent.¹ The prosecution does not have to prove any plan to keep the car permanently, sell it, or strip it. Knowing and willful taking without permission is enough.

“Owner” is defined broadly. It covers anyone with a lawful interest in the vehicle and anyone in lawful possession with the title owner’s consent, so taking a car from a friend who borrowed it counts the same as taking it from the person on the title.¹

A conviction under 7-105 is always a felony. There is no misdemeanor version. The maximum is five years in prison, a fine up to $5,000, or both, and the court must order the defendant to return the vehicle or pay its full value if return is not possible.¹ That restoration order is written into the statute, not left to the judge.

One more detail matters. Section 7-105 does not prevent prosecutors from also charging general theft under Section 7-104 for the same incident. If both convictions land, the 7-105 count merges into the 7-104 count for sentencing.¹ Prosecutors often stack both to preserve options at trial.

General Theft Charges and Why the Vehicle’s Value Matters

Because Section 7-104 sets penalties by dollar value, most stolen cars trigger sentences well above the 7-105 ceiling. The tiers run:²

Under $100: misdemeanor, up to 90 days and a $500 fine.
$100 to under $1,500: misdemeanor, up to 6 months and a $500 fine on a first offense; up to 1 year on a second or later conviction.
$1,500 to under $25,000: felony, up to 5 years and a $10,000 fine.
$25,000 to under $100,000: felony, up to 10 years and a $15,000 fine.
$100,000 or more: felony, up to 20 years and a $25,000 fine.

A stolen $30,000 truck sits in the 10-year tier, twice the exposure of a straight 7-105 count. Every tier also carries the same restore-or-pay requirement.²

Repeat offenders face a separate enhancement. A person with four or more prior theft convictions who steals property worth less than $1,500 can be sentenced as if the offense were far more serious, with up to 5 years in prison and a $5,000 fine.²

Unauthorized Removal: The Joyriding Statute

Maryland has a separate charge for taking a vehicle without permission when the facts don’t fit a traditional theft. Section 7-203 makes it illegal to take and carry away a vehicle from someone’s premises or custody without consent. Intending to return the car is expressly not a defense.³

The offense is a misdemeanor, but the sentence runs from 6 months to 4 years of imprisonment plus a fine of $50 to $100, and the defendant must return the vehicle or pay its full value.³ A four-year cap is unusually high for a Maryland misdemeanor.

Carjacking

When a vehicle is taken through force, intimidation, or threats, the charge is no longer theft. It is carjacking under Section 3-405, a felony carrying up to 30 years in prison. Armed carjacking, involving a dangerous weapon, falls under the same statute and the same 30-year ceiling, though it typically produces harsher actual sentences.⁴

Two features of the statute matter at sentencing. The carjacking sentence can run consecutively to any other conviction arising from the same incident, such as assault or robbery. And it is expressly not a defense that the defendant did not intend to keep the vehicle permanently.⁴

Federal Carjacking Exposure

Federal prosecutors can charge carjacking under 18 U.S.C. § 2119 whenever force is used to take a vehicle that has moved in interstate commerce, which describes nearly every car on the road. Penalties escalate with harm:

No serious injury: up to 15 years in federal prison, a fine, or both.
Serious bodily injury: up to 25 years, a fine, or both.
Death results: up to life in federal prison, a fine, or both, or the death penalty.

Attempted carjacking is also covered, so the defendant does not need to succeed in taking the vehicle to face these penalties.⁵ Federal charges are prosecuted separately from state charges, and both can proceed for a single incident.

Restitution on Top of the Sentence

Prison time and fines are only part of the financial picture. Under Criminal Procedure Section 11-603, a court may order restitution whenever property was stolen, damaged, destroyed, or lost significant value as a direct result of the crime, and the victim is presumed entitled to it if they request it with competent evidence of loss.⁶

Restitution can cover more than the vehicle’s value. Towing, storage, and preservation costs incurred by the government can be added to the order.⁶ This runs alongside the restore-or-pay requirements built into Sections 7-104, 7-105, and 7-203, so a single conviction can generate financial obligations under multiple provisions.

Defenses to a Maryland Car Theft Charge

The prosecution has to prove the taking was knowing, willful, and without consent. Each of those elements is a possible fight.

Consent or Claimed Right

Disputes between family members, roommates, or business partners over shared vehicles produce a lot of these cases. If the accused genuinely believed they had permission, or holds a documented ownership interest in the vehicle, the “without consent” element may not survive. Prior access, written agreements, and testimony about how the vehicle had been used before can all support the defense.

Mistaken Identity

Vehicle thefts often happen without direct witnesses. When the case rests on eyewitness testimony, blurry surveillance video, or circumstantial evidence, the defense can challenge identification procedures, cross-examine on lighting and distance, and offer alibi evidence. Fingerprints inside a car may have innocent explanations if the accused had lawful access before.

Fourth Amendment Challenges

Evidence from an unlawful search or seizure can be suppressed. If police searched a vehicle, home, or phone without a valid warrant or a recognized exception, or arrested without probable cause, the resulting evidence and statements may be excluded, sometimes leaving too little for the prosecution to proceed.

Lack of Knowledge

Section 7-105 requires that the taking be knowing and willful. Someone who drove off in a rental car mix-up, or in a nearly identical vehicle in a crowded lot, can argue the taking was not knowing. The defense is narrow and fact-specific, but it exists because the statute demands awareness, not just an unauthorized taking.

If Your Vehicle Was the One Stolen

Call local police first and file a report. That report is the record everything else runs on: the insurance claim, the FBI National Crime Information Center entry, and any prosecution that follows. NCIC is a 24/7 database used by law enforcement across the country and maintains a dedicated stolen vehicle file.⁷

Under Maryland Transportation Section 14-105, owners may notify the Motor Vehicle Administration that a titled or registered vehicle has been stolen, and are required to notify the MVA again if it is later recovered. Contact your insurer promptly.

Insurance recovery depends on the coverage you carry. Theft losses fall under comprehensive coverage, which is optional. If you carry only liability, an unrecovered stolen car is your loss. With comprehensive, the insurer pays the vehicle’s actual cash value minus the deductible; that figure reflects depreciation and can fall well short of the loan balance unless you also carry gap or loan/lease payoff coverage. Belongings taken from inside the car generally are not covered by auto policies and fall under homeowners or renters insurance if you have it. Aftermarket parts often have limited coverage, sometimes capped around $1,000, so heavily modified vehicles may need a custom parts endorsement.

Before buying a used vehicle, the National Insurance Crime Bureau’s free VINCheck tool searches participating insurers’ theft and salvage records. It does not reach law enforcement databases, so it is a starting point rather than a full history report.⁸

1
Maryland General Assembly. Maryland Code Criminal Law 7-105 – Motor Vehicle Theft
2
Maryland General Assembly. Maryland Code Criminal Law 7-104 – General Theft
3
Maryland General Assembly. Maryland Code Criminal Law 7-203 – Unauthorized Removal of Property
4
Maryland General Assembly. Maryland Code Criminal Law 3-405 – Carjacking
5
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 2119 – Motor Vehicles
6
Maryland General Assembly. Maryland Code Criminal Procedure 11-603
7
Federation of American Scientists. National Crime Information Center (NCIC)
8
National Insurance Crime Bureau. VINCheck Lookup