Arizona Revised Statutes section 13-1001 is the state’s criminal attempt statute, and it lets prosecutors charge you for trying to commit a crime even when nothing was stolen, no one was hurt, and the plan never came together. A conviction under ARS 13-1001 is punished one felony class below the completed offense, so the gap between “almost” and “did” is narrower than most people expect. The statute reaches three different kinds of conduct, requires the same mental state as the underlying crime, and leaves very little room for the defense that the crime was never actually possible.
The Three Theories of Attempt Under ARS 13-1001
Subsection A of the statute gives prosecutors three separate paths. Only one has to fit.1Arizona Legislature. Arizona Revised Statutes 13-1001 – Attempt; Classifications
- You intentionally do something that would be a completed offense if the circumstances were as you believed them to be. Taking property you think belongs to someone else is attempted theft even if the property turns out to be yours.
- You intentionally do, or deliberately fail to do, anything that is a step in a course of conduct you planned to end in a completed offense. This is the theory prosecutors use most often.
- You engage in conduct meant to help another person commit an offense, even if that other person never commits or attempts it, as long as your conduct would make you legally complicit had the crime gone forward.
The three theories cover different situations, but they share a common thread: the law is measuring what you were trying to do, not what ended up happening in the physical world.
The Mental State the Prosecution Must Prove
ARS 13-1001 requires that you act “with the kind of culpability otherwise required for commission of an offense.”1Arizona Legislature. Arizona Revised Statutes 13-1001 – Attempt; Classifications Whatever mental state the completed crime demands is the mental state the prosecution has to prove for the attempt. For theft, that means intent to permanently deprive. For arson, that means knowingly damaging a structure.
In practice, most attempt prosecutions turn on intent, because the first two paths in the statute both use the word “intentionally.” Your conscious objective has to be completing the crime. Getting close by accident is not an attempt. Proving what someone meant to do, based on their actions and the circumstances around them, is usually where these cases are won or lost.
Substantial Step Versus Mere Preparation
The second theory requires a “step in a course of conduct planned to culminate in commission of an offense.”1Arizona Legislature. Arizona Revised Statutes 13-1001 – Attempt; Classifications The step has to go beyond mere preparation and show a genuine commitment to carrying out the crime. Thinking about robbing a bank is not a crime. Drawing up a floor plan and buying a disguise starts to be.
Where that line falls is the single most litigated question in attempt cases. Conduct that only makes a future crime possible, like researching targets or setting money aside, tends to stay on the preparation side. Conduct that puts the plan into motion tends to cross over. Arriving at the scene with specialized tools, lying in wait for a specific target, entering a building unlawfully as part of a planned crime, and gathering materials uniquely useful for the offense are the kinds of actions treated as substantial steps. The question courts ask is whether the conduct strongly corroborates the criminal purpose. A step with no innocent explanation carries much more weight than one that could be benign.
Arizona’s statute uses the phrase “any step,” which is broader than what some other states require. You do not have to reach the last act before the crime would be complete. But a single trivial action at the start of a long plan probably will not be enough on its own. Courts look at how close the conduct brought you to actually finishing the offense.
Impossibility Is Not a Defense
Subsection B of ARS 13-1001 states explicitly that a person cannot defend an attempt charge by arguing it was impossible to help the other party commit the offense, as long as they could have done so had things been as they believed.1Arizona Legislature. Arizona Revised Statutes 13-1001 – Attempt; Classifications Arizona follows the broader rule that factual impossibility does not excuse an attempt either. Trying to buy what you believe are illegal drugs can be charged as attempted possession even if the substance turns out to be baking soda. Courts sometimes distinguish “legal impossibility,” where the act you intended was never a crime at all, but that defense rarely succeeds.
How Attempt Charges Are Classified
Every attempt is classified exactly one level below the target offense. The table in ARS 13-1001(C) works like this:
- Attempted Class 1 felony: Class 2 felony
- Attempted Class 2 felony: Class 3 felony
- Attempted Class 3 felony: Class 4 felony
- Attempted Class 4 felony: Class 5 felony
- Attempted Class 5 felony: Class 6 felony
- Attempted Class 6 felony: Class 1 misdemeanor
- Attempted Class 1 misdemeanor: Class 2 misdemeanor
- Attempted Class 2 misdemeanor: Class 3 misdemeanor
- Attempted Class 3 misdemeanor or petty offense: petty offense
The one-class drop reflects the idea that an unfinished crime causes less harm, but the gap is small.2Arizona Legislature. Arizona Revised Statutes Title 13 Criminal Code 13-1001 – Attempt; Classifications One row matters more than the others: attempting a Class 6 felony crosses the felony-misdemeanor line entirely and becomes a Class 1 misdemeanor. For your record and your civil rights, that difference is significant.
Prison Ranges for an Attempt Conviction
Because the classification drops, so does the sentencing range. For a first-time, non-dangerous felony offender, the presumptive ranges under ARS 13-702 are:
- Class 2 felony (attempted Class 1): 3 to 12.5 years
- Class 3 felony (attempted Class 2): 2 to 8.75 years
- Class 4 felony (attempted Class 3): 1 to 3.75 years
- Class 5 felony (attempted Class 4): 6 months to 2.5 years
- Class 6 felony (attempted Class 5): 4 months to 2 years
Each range runs from the mitigated end to the aggravated end, depending on which sentencing factors the court finds.3Arizona Legislature. Arizona Revised Statutes 13-702 – First Time Felony Offenders; Sentencing; Definition The maximum fine for any felony in Arizona is $150,000.4Arizona Legislature. Arizona Revised Statutes 13-801 – Fines for Felonies An attempted Class 6 felony that drops to a Class 1 misdemeanor carries a maximum of six months in jail.5Arizona Legislature. Arizona Revised Statutes Title 13 Criminal Code 13-707
Dangerous Offense Enhancement
When an attempt involves a dangerous offense, meaning it included the use, threatened use, or attempted use of a deadly weapon or dangerous instrument, sentencing jumps sharply under ARS 13-704. An attempted Class 2 felony designated as dangerous carries 5 to 15 years for a first offense, and an attempted Class 3 felony designated as dangerous carries 4 to 8 years.6Arizona Legislature. Arizona Revised Statutes 13-704 – Dangerous Offenders; Sentencing An attempted armed robbery, for example, is a Class 3 felony with a dangerous-offense designation, and the floor alone is 5 years.
Renunciation: The Way Out
Arizona gives you a way out if you genuinely change your mind before the crime happens. Under ARS 13-1005, voluntary renunciation is a defense to attempt charges. You have to show two things: that you voluntarily and completely abandoned your criminal intent, and that you either gave law enforcement a timely warning or made a reasonable effort to prevent the crime from happening.7Arizona Legislature. Arizona Revised Statutes 13-1005 – Renunciation of Attempt, Solicitation, Conspiracy or Facilitation; Defenses
Not every change of heart qualifies. Renunciation is not voluntary if it was driven by a higher risk of getting caught, by circumstances that made the crime harder to pull off, or by a decision to postpone or switch to a different target. Walking away because a security guard appeared is not renunciation. Walking away because you decided the act was wrong, then calling the police, is. A warning to law enforcement only counts as timely if officers, acting reasonably on it, would have had a chance to prevent the crime. The defendant carries the burden of proving renunciation, and prosecutors will press hard on whether any outside pressure influenced the decision.
What Happens If the Crime Is Completed
If you actually finish the crime, you generally cannot be convicted of both the attempt and the completed offense arising from the same conduct. The attempt merges into the finished crime. In practice, attempt often operates as a fallback charge: if the prosecution cannot prove every element of the completed offense, the jury can still return a conviction on the attempt.