The statute of limitations by crime sets how long prosecutors have to file charges after an offense happens. Under federal law, the default is five years, but financial institution crimes stretch to ten, tax fraud to six, and murder, genocide, and certain child sex offenses have no deadline at all. State deadlines run from about one year for minor misdemeanors to ten or more for serious felonies, and nearly every state treats murder as prosecutable at any time.
Crimes You Can Be Charged With at Any Time
Some offenses never time out. If a crime falls into one of these categories, it doesn’t matter whether five years or fifty have passed.
Murder and Other Capital Offenses
Any federal offense punishable by death can be prosecuted at any time.1Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 3281 – Capital Offenses Murder is the obvious example, but the rule also covers treason and certain large-scale drug trafficking offenses. Virtually every state exempts murder from its statute of limitations, and many extend the same treatment to other first-degree offenses.
Child Kidnapping and Felony Sex Offenses Against Minors
Federal law eliminates the statute of limitations entirely for child kidnapping and felony sex offenses involving minors, including child exploitation and sex trafficking of children.2Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 3299 – Child Abduction and Sex Offenses For other child sex offenses that don’t fall under that blanket elimination, the deadline runs for the life of the victim or ten years after the offense, whichever is longer.3Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 3283 – Offenses Against Children Many states have adopted similar rules.
Terrorism Resulting in Death and Genocide
Federal terrorism offenses carry no time limit when the attack resulted in death or created a foreseeable risk of death or serious bodily injury.4Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 3286 – Extension of Statute of Limitation for Certain Terrorism Offenses Genocide can also be prosecuted at any time under federal law.5Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 1091 – Genocide
Federal Deadlines for Everything Else
If a federal crime isn’t punishable by death and isn’t singled out by another statute, prosecutors have five years to file charges.6Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 3282 – Offenses Not Capital That default covers most misdemeanors and most felonies.
Congress has extended the window for crimes that tend to take time to uncover:
- Bank fraud, embezzlement from a bank, and mail or wire fraud affecting a financial institution: ten years.7Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 3293 – Financial Institution Offenses
- Tax fraud and evasion: six years. Simpler tax violations drop to three.8Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 USC 6531 – Periods of Limitation on Criminal Prosecutions
State Deadlines Vary Widely
State limits are not uniform, and the same offense can carry very different deadlines depending on where it happened. The general pattern looks like this:
- Misdemeanors such as petty theft, simple assault, and vandalism typically carry one- to two-year limits.
- Non-capital felonies generally fall in the three-to-ten-year range, depending on severity.
- Murder, and often other first-degree offenses, have no limit at all.
If you need the exact number for a specific charge in a specific state, that answer lives in that state’s criminal code, not in any national rule of thumb.
When the Clock Starts
The default is simple: the clock starts the day the crime was committed. For a robbery or an assault, that date is obvious. Two situations complicate it.
Continuing offenses. Some crimes keep happening until the illegal conduct stops. Conspiracy, possession of contraband, and escape from custody are treated this way, so the clock doesn’t begin until the last act in the ongoing offense.9United States Department of Justice. Criminal Resource Manual 651 – Statute of Limitations for Continuing Offenses Courts are cautious about applying this label and require clear statutory language or strong evidence that Congress intended it.
The discovery rule. For some fraud and concealment offenses, courts delay the start of the clock until the crime was discovered or should have been discovered. This matters most in financial fraud, embezzlement, and identity theft, where victims often don’t realize anything happened for years.
What Pauses or Extends the Clock
Even after the clock starts, certain events can freeze it. Lawyers call this tolling.
Fleeing From Justice
Federal law is blunt: no statute of limitations applies to anyone fleeing from justice.10Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 3290 – Fugitives From Justice Leaving the jurisdiction or going into hiding stops the clock until the suspect is found or returns. Most states have similar provisions.
Victims Under 18
For federal crimes involving the sexual or physical abuse or kidnapping of someone under 18, the deadline runs until the child’s death or ten years after the offense, whichever is longer.3Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 3283 – Offenses Against Children
Evidence Held Abroad
When evidence needed for a federal prosecution sits in another country, prosecutors can ask a court to suspend the clock while they pursue it through diplomatic channels. The pause begins when the formal request is made and ends when the foreign authority takes final action, capped at three years total.11Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 3292 – Suspension of Limitations to Permit United States to Obtain Foreign Evidence
DNA Matches
When DNA testing implicates a specific person in a federal felony, the statute of limitations is effectively doubled. Prosecutors get an additional period equal to the original limitation window, starting from the date of the DNA match.12Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 3297 – Cases Involving DNA Evidence Some prosecutors also file “John Doe” indictments against an unnamed suspect identified only by a DNA profile, which stops the clock while investigators search for a name.
What Happens When the Deadline Passes
Once the time has run out, the government generally cannot prosecute. But the protection isn’t automatic in federal court. Expiration is a defense the accused usually has to raise, and if nobody objects, the case can move forward anyway. A defense attorney who spots the issue will move to dismiss before trial.
One detail that catches people off guard: the deadline is satisfied as long as the indictment or formal charge is filed before it expires. The arrest, trial, and sentencing can all come later. A charge filed on the last possible day is still timely, even if nothing else happens for months.