Florida’s assault statute, section 784.011, makes it a crime to intentionally threaten another person with violence when you appear able to carry out the threat and your conduct creates a reasonable fear of imminent harm. No physical contact is required. Depending on whether a weapon is involved and who the victim is, charges range from a second-degree misdemeanor punishable by 60 days in jail to a second-degree felony carrying up to 15 years in prison. A conviction can also cost you your firearm rights, your immigration status, and your ability to pass a background check.
What the Statute Requires
Prosecutors have to prove three things. You deliberately threatened violence through words, gestures, or actions. You appeared capable of carrying the threat out at that moment. And the fear your conduct caused was reasonable, meaning an average person in the same situation would have felt threatened too.1Florida Senate. Florida Code 784.011 – Assault If any one of those elements is missing, the charge shouldn’t stick.
The word “imminent” carries a lot of weight. A vague promise to hurt someone next week isn’t assault. Neither is a threat from someone who plainly can’t act on it, like shouting from across a football field. Verbal threats alone, without some accompanying action or apparent present ability to follow through, don’t satisfy the statute. And the victim’s fear has to be objectively reasonable, not just subjective. Context is everything: the same gesture might be harmless in one setting and terrifying in another.
Conditional Threats
“Give me your wallet or I’ll hurt you” is still assault. The threat creates immediate fear even though the harm depends on what you do next, and Florida courts generally treat conditional threats as assault when the speaker has the present ability to act and the condition being imposed is itself unlawful. The analysis flips when the condition essentially negates the threat. “If you weren’t my grandmother, I’d knock you out” is an acknowledgment that the speaker won’t act, so the listener has no reason to fear imminent harm.
Simple Assault
Simple assault is a second-degree misdemeanor.1Florida Senate. Florida Code 784.011 – Assault2Official Internet Site of the Florida Legislature. Florida Statutes 775.082 – Penalties3Official Internet Site of the Florida Legislature. Florida Statutes 775.083 – Fines First-time offenders often draw probation, anger management, or community service instead of jail time. Even then, the conviction goes on your permanent record and shows up on background checks.
Aggravated Assault
Aggravated assault is a third-degree felony. It applies when you use a deadly weapon without intent to kill, or when you commit an assault while intending to commit a felony.4Florida Senate. Florida Code 784.021 – Aggravated Assault2Official Internet Site of the Florida Legislature. Florida Statutes 775.082 – Penalties3Official Internet Site of the Florida Legislature. Florida Statutes 775.083 – Fines
Enhancements That Change Everything
Protected Victims
Florida increases the charge one full level when the victim was performing official duties as a law enforcement officer, firefighter, paramedic, corrections officer, or certain other public employees, including security officers, public transit and utility workers on critical infrastructure, and traffic enforcement officers. Simple assault jumps from a second-degree to a first-degree misdemeanor (up to one year in jail, $1,000 fine). Aggravated assault jumps from a third-degree to a second-degree felony (up to 15 years in prison, $10,000 fine).5Florida Senate. Florida Code 784.07 – Assault or Battery of Law Enforcement Officers and Other Specified Personnel2Official Internet Site of the Florida Legislature. Florida Statutes 775.082 – Penalties3Official Internet Site of the Florida Legislature. Florida Statutes 775.083 – Fines To apply the enhancement, prosecutors must show the accused knew or should have known the victim was acting in an official capacity. An off-duty officer in plainclothes at the grocery store isn’t automatically covered.
Assault During a Riot
Simple assault committed during a riot or aggravated riot is automatically reclassified from a second-degree misdemeanor to a first-degree misdemeanor, roughly doubling the maximum penalties.6Official Internet Site of the Florida Legislature. Florida Statutes 784.011 – Assault
10-20-Life Firearm Minimums
This is where aggravated assault cases with a gun turn life-altering. Under Florida’s 10-20-Life law, possessing a firearm during an aggravated assault triggers a three-year mandatory minimum (aggravated assault is a specific exception to the usual ten-year minimum). If you actually discharge the weapon, the mandatory minimum jumps to 20 years whether anyone is hit or not. If the shot causes death or great bodily harm, the court must impose 25 years to life.7Florida Senate. Florida Code 775.087 – Possession or Use of Weapon; Aggravated Battery; Felony Reclassification; Minimum Sentence A judge cannot sentence below these floors, even for a first offender with a clean record.
Restitution
On top of fines and imprisonment, courts can order restitution to the victim covering medical care, therapy, rehabilitation, and related expenses when the offense causes bodily injury. If you’re placed on probation, paying restitution in full is a condition, and failing to pay can revoke your probation. An unpaid order accrues interest and can become a lien on your real property, functioning like a civil judgment that follows you long after the criminal case closes.8Official Internet Site of the Florida Legislature. Florida Statutes 775.089 – Restitution
How Long the State Has to File Charges
Simple assault has a one-year statute of limitations. Aggravated assault has three years.9Official Internet Site of the Florida Legislature. Florida Statutes 775.15 – Time Limitations The clock runs from the date of the offense, though some circumstances can pause or extend it. If the state doesn’t file within the window, prosecution is barred.
Defenses That Actually Work
No Intent to Threaten
Because assault requires a deliberate threat, accidental or misinterpreted actions don’t qualify. Waving at someone who flinches because they think you’re about to strike them isn’t assault. The state has to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that you intended to threaten violence, and where that intent is ambiguous, juries often acquit. This defense gets underused because people assume the accuser’s fear alone is enough for a conviction. It isn’t.
Self-Defense and the Stand Your Ground Hearing
Florida’s self-defense statute allows you to use or threaten force when you reasonably believe it’s necessary to protect yourself or someone else from imminent unlawful force. There’s no duty to retreat before using non-deadly force. Deadly force is protected under Stand Your Ground as long as you weren’t engaged in criminal activity and were somewhere you had a right to be.10The Florida Legislature. Florida Statutes 776.012 – Use or Threatened Use of Force in Defense of Person
The most powerful piece of Florida’s law is the pretrial immunity hearing. Rather than waiting for trial, a defendant claiming self-defense can request a hearing where the judge alone decides immunity. Once the defendant raises a prima facie claim, the burden shifts to the prosecution to disprove it by clear and convincing evidence.11Florida Senate. Florida Statutes 776.032 – Immunity From Criminal Prosecution and Civil Action If the state fails, the case is dismissed before it ever reaches a jury. A successful immunity ruling also shields you from civil lawsuits arising from the same incident.
Defense of Property
You can use or threaten non-deadly force to prevent someone from trespassing on or criminally interfering with your real or personal property, and there’s no duty to retreat. But deadly force is only justified to stop the imminent commission of a forcible felony, not to protect property from ordinary theft or damage.12Official Internet Site of the Florida Legislature. Florida Statutes 776.031 – Use or Threatened Use of Force in Defense of Property Threatening to shoot someone for stealing a lawn ornament goes well past what the statute allows.
Attacking the Accuser’s Credibility
Assault charges frequently come out of domestic disputes, bar fights, and neighbor conflicts where emotions run high and accounts diverge. Accusations get fabricated out of anger, revenge, or misunderstanding. When it’s one person’s word against another’s, defense counsel can challenge credibility through surveillance footage, witness testimony, prior inconsistent statements, or evidence of a motive to lie. Most assault defenses are won or lost here, not on dramatic legal theories.
What a Conviction Costs You Beyond the Sentence
Firearm Rights
Federal law bars anyone convicted of a felony punishable by more than one year from possessing firearms or ammunition, so any aggravated assault conviction triggers a lifetime ban that covers guns you already own.13Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 U.S. Code 922 – Unlawful Acts Even a misdemeanor assault conviction can trigger a federal ban under the Lautenberg Amendment if the offense qualifies as a “misdemeanor crime of domestic violence,” meaning the victim was a current or former spouse, a co-parent, a cohabitant, or someone in a similar domestic relationship. The ban has no expiration date.14United States Department of Justice Archives. Restrictions on the Possession of Firearms by Individuals Convicted of a Misdemeanor Crime of Domestic Violence For anyone in law enforcement, the military, or private security, that can end a career overnight.
Immigration Status
For non-citizens, the immigration consequences of an assault conviction can be worse than the criminal penalties. Federal law treats a “crime of violence” with a sentence of one year or more as an aggravated felony, which is a deportable offense.15Legal Information Institute (LII) / Cornell Law School. 8 U.S. Code 1101(a)(43) – Definition of Aggravated Felony A crime of violence is defined broadly as any offense involving the use, attempted use, or threatened use of physical force.16Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 U.S. Code 16 – Crime of Violence Defined Florida aggravated assault fits that definition when the sentence imposed is at least a year.
Some assault offenses also qualify as “crimes involving moral turpitude,” which can make a non-citizen inadmissible or deportable even without a felony conviction. The State Department places assault with a deadly weapon, assault with intent to commit serious bodily harm, and assault with intent to commit robbery in this category. Simple assault, standing alone, generally does not qualify.17U.S. Department of State Foreign Affairs Manual. Crimes Involving Moral Turpitude – INA 212(a)(2)(A)(i)(I) Any non-citizen charged with assault should have an immigration attorney working alongside criminal defense counsel.
Employment, Housing, and Records
An assault conviction shows up on background checks. Healthcare, education, and law enforcement employers routinely screen for violent offenses, and even a misdemeanor can disqualify applicants. Landlords running background checks may deny housing based on the same record. Florida allows expungement of some criminal records, but eligibility generally requires that the charges were dismissed, dropped, or resolved through diversion without a conviction. If you were actually convicted of assault, you typically cannot expunge that record, though sealing may be available in limited circumstances. The process runs through the Florida Department of Law Enforcement and the court, and the eligibility rules are unforgiving.18Official Internet Site of the Florida Legislature. Florida Statutes 943.0585 – Court-Ordered Expunction of Criminal History Records
One boundary worth naming: an acquittal in criminal court doesn’t end civil exposure. A person the state fails to convict can still be sued for damages by the alleged victim, because a civil case only requires a preponderance of the evidence rather than proof beyond a reasonable doubt.