The California criminal statute of limitations sets how long prosecutors have to file charges after a crime, and the window depends almost entirely on how serious the offense is. Most misdemeanors must be charged within one year. Most felonies get three years. Felonies punishable by eight or more years in prison get six. Fraud-based offenses get four years from discovery. Murder and other crimes carrying death or life in prison have no deadline at all.
Those are the defaults. Dozens of specific crimes have their own rules written into the Penal Code, so the tier your offense falls into is a starting point rather than the final answer.
Filing Deadlines by Crime Severity
- One year — most misdemeanors, including petty theft, simple assault, and a standard DUI.
- Three years — felonies punishable by less than eight years in state prison. Assault with a deadly weapon, second-degree robbery, and residential burglary fall here.
- Four years — fraud-related felonies, grand theft, embezzlement of an elder or dependent adult, breach of fiduciary duty, and misconduct in office by a public official. The clock on these does not start until the crime is discovered.
- Five years — domestic violence involving corporal injury to a spouse or cohabitant.
- Six years — felonies punishable by eight or more years in state prison, including first-degree robbery.
- Ten years — felony sex offenses that require registration under Penal Code 290 but don’t fall under one of the longer provisions below.1California Legislative Information. California Penal Code 801.1
- No time limit — offenses punishable by death or life in prison, embezzlement of public money, and certain serious sex crimes.
Crimes With No Deadline
Under Penal Code 799, any offense punishable by death or life in prison can be charged at any time.2California Legislative Information. California Penal Code 799 Murder is the clearest example, and aggravated kidnapping and other life-sentence crimes sit alongside it. Embezzlement of public money is singled out with no deadline even when the potential sentence falls short of life.
Since 2017, California has also eliminated the deadline for a broad list of serious sex crimes, including forcible rape and sexual acts accomplished by force or threats. The rule applies to offenses committed on or after January 1, 2017, and to any earlier offense whose previous deadline had not yet expired on that date.2California Legislative Information. California Penal Code 799
Sex Crimes Against Minors
When the victim of a felony sex offense was under 18 at the time of the crime, prosecutors can bring charges any time before the victim turns 40.1California Legislative Information. California Penal Code 801.1 The rule covers offenses like rape, sodomy, lewd acts on a child, and continuous sexual abuse. It applies to crimes committed on or after January 1, 2015, and to older crimes whose previous deadline had not yet run on that date.
A misdemeanor involving annoying or molesting a child under 14 gets three years rather than the usual one.3California Legislative Information. California Penal Code 802 Sexual exploitation by a physician or therapist carries a two-year misdemeanor deadline.
Fraud and the Discovery Rule
Fraud offenses get four years from the date the crime is discovered or reasonably should have been discovered, not four years from the date the fraud happened.4California Legislative Information. California Penal Code 803 The rule covers insurance fraud, welfare fraud, securities violations, falsification of public records, bribery of a public official, grand theft, embezzlement from an elder or dependent adult, breach of fiduciary duty, and misconduct in office.
The practical effect is significant. A contractor who siphons money from a client over several years may not face charges until an audit surfaces the loss, and the four-year window runs from the audit, not from the first missing dollar. The discovery rule does not apply to crimes in general simply because they went undetected. A burglary nobody witnessed still has its clock start on the date it happened.
DNA Evidence in Cold Cases
When DNA testing identifies a suspect in a sex offense, California allows prosecution within one year of the date the suspect’s identity is conclusively established through DNA.4California Legislative Information. California Penal Code 803 The offense must be one that requires sex offender registration, and the biological evidence must have been analyzed within specific timeframes tied to when the crime occurred. Combined with the 2017 elimination of the deadline for many serious sex crimes, this provision allows decades-old cases to be filed once a database match surfaces.
When the Clock Starts
For most crimes, the clock begins the moment the offense is committed. The exception is the discovery rule under Penal Code 803(c), which delays the start date for the fraud, embezzlement, and official-misconduct offenses listed above.4California Legislative Information. California Penal Code 803 Environmental crimes under the Water Code and certain Health and Safety Code sections also use a discovery-based start date.
When the Clock Pauses
California is strict about tolling. Penal Code 803(a) says the deadline is not paused for any reason except those the statute specifically lists.4California Legislative Information. California Penal Code 803
The most common pause is a defendant leaving California. When a suspect is out of state during or after the crime, up to three years of that absence doesn’t count toward the deadline. A crime with a three-year deadline, committed by someone who then spent two years out of state, effectively gives prosecutors five years from the date of the crime. The three-year cap keeps the pause from extending the deadline indefinitely.
The clock also pauses while prosecution for the same conduct is already pending in a California court. If charges are filed, dismissed on a technicality, and refiled, the time the first case was pending doesn’t count against the deadline.
How Wobblers Work
California has many “wobbler” offenses that prosecutors can file as either a felony or a misdemeanor. Under Penal Code 805, the applicable deadline is based on the maximum punishment the statute allows, regardless of what the prosecutor actually seeks.5California Legislative Information. California Penal Code 805 Because a wobbler can be charged as a felony, the felony deadline controls. A prosecutor doesn’t lose the option of charging a wobbler as a misdemeanor just because the one-year misdemeanor window has closed. As long as the felony clock is still running, the case can still be filed either way. Sentencing enhancements are disregarded when calculating the maximum.
What Counts as Filing in Time
The statute of limitations is satisfied as long as prosecution is “commenced” before the deadline expires. Under Penal Code 804, prosecution is commenced by any of the following:
- Filing an indictment or information after a grand jury proceeding or preliminary hearing.
- Filing a misdemeanor or infraction complaint.
- Arraigning the defendant on a felony complaint.
- Issuing an arrest or bench warrant that identifies the defendant with the same level of specificity required in a formal charging document.6California Legislative Information. California Penal Code 804
The warrant provision matters. If police identify a suspect near the end of the limitations period but cannot locate the person, a properly specific warrant preserves the case. The arrest itself can come years later.
Challenging a Late Filing
If charges were filed after the deadline expired, the defense is raised through a pretrial motion to dismiss. The defendant bears the burden of proving the deadline has passed. A court will grant the motion only when no reasonable interpretation of the timeline puts the filing within the allowed period.
In practice, these disputes usually turn on when the clock started rather than on simple calendar math. Prosecutors often argue the discovery rule delayed the start date, that out-of-state absence tolled the clock, or that the DNA exception applies. Each argument introduces factual questions that can keep a case alive past a pretrial challenge. Proving an expired statute of limitations is one of the strongest defenses available in a criminal case, but it depends on pinning down the exact dates the offense occurred, the date it was discovered, and any events that paused the countdown.