Harassment Laws in Arkansas: Stalking, Charges, and Penalties

Harassment laws in Arkansas cover a range of offenses, from a Class A misdemeanor for basic harassment up to a Class B felony for first-degree stalking. The state treats general harassment, harassing communications, and cyberbullying as distinct crimes, and it separates stalking into three degrees based on the severity of the conduct, any threats made, and whether an existing protective order was in place. Penalties run from 90 days in jail on the low end to twenty years in prison on the high end.

What Counts as Harassment

Under Arkansas Code 5-71-208, harassment requires two things the prosecutor must prove: the person acted with the purpose of harassing, annoying, or alarming someone else, and the conduct was without good cause. Behavior that happens to bother someone is not enough. The state has to show the defendant meant to have that effect.

The statute lists six categories of conduct that qualify:¹

Striking, shoving, kicking, or otherwise touching someone offensively, or attempting or threatening to do so.
Directing obscene words or gestures at someone in public in a way likely to provoke a violent or disorderly response.
Following someone in or around a public place.
Repeatedly insulting, taunting, or challenging someone in public in a way likely to provoke a violent or disorderly response.
Engaging in conduct or repeated acts that alarm or seriously annoy another person and serve no legitimate purpose.
Remaining outside someone’s school, workplace, vehicle, or residence (other than the defendant’s own residence) for no purpose other than to harass, alarm, or annoy.

Harassment is a Class A misdemeanor.¹

Harassing Communications

Arkansas Code 5-71-209 focuses on the method rather than the setting. A person commits harassing communications by using a phone call, mail, email, text message, social media post, or any other electronic communication with the purpose of harassing, annoying, or alarming another person. The statute also reaches repeated anonymous calls at inconvenient hours, threats of unlawful action made by phone or electronic message, and knowingly allowing someone else to use your phone or device for those purposes.²

A second branch of the same statute covers communicating a false report that someone has been injured or killed, done with the purpose of frightening, intimidating, or emotionally distressing someone. Communicating in a way the sender knows or should know would frighten or emotionally distress a reasonable person also qualifies, even without a false report. Harassing communications is a Class A misdemeanor.²

Cyberbullying

Cyberbullying is its own offense under Arkansas Code 5-71-217. A person commits cyberbullying by transmitting, sending, or posting an electronic communication with the purpose of frightening, coercing, intimidating, threatening, abusing, or harassing another person. The conduct must involve severe, repeated, or hostile behavior toward the victim. Cyberbullying is normally a Class B misdemeanor. When the victim is a school employee, the charge rises to a Class A misdemeanor.³

When Harassment Becomes Stalking

Arkansas Code 5-71-229 splits stalking into three degrees. The distance between them is significant: a Class A misdemeanor at the bottom, a Class B felony at the top.

Stalking in the Third Degree

Third-degree stalking applies when someone knowingly commits an act that would place a reasonable person in the victim’s position under emotional distress and in fear for their own safety or the safety of another person. No pattern is required. A single act can support the charge. Third-degree stalking is a Class A misdemeanor.⁴

Stalking in the Second Degree

The charge climbs to second-degree stalking when a person knowingly engages in a course of conduct that harasses another person and makes a terroristic threat intended to place the victim in imminent fear of death or serious bodily injury. The threat can be aimed at the victim or at their immediate family. Second-degree stalking is a Class C felony.⁴

Stalking in the First Degree

First-degree stalking requires a course of conduct that would place a reasonable person under emotional distress and in fear, plus at least one aggravating factor: the stalking violates an existing order of protection or no-contact order; the defendant has a prior conviction within the past ten years for second-degree stalking or terroristic threatening; or the defendant is armed with a deadly weapon or represents that they are. First-degree stalking is a Class B felony.⁴

What Course of Conduct Means

The stalking statute defines course of conduct precisely: two or more acts separated by at least 36 hours but occurring within one year. The acts can include following, monitoring, observing, surveilling, threatening, or communicating to or about a person, done directly, indirectly, or through a third party. Constitutionally protected activity is excluded, and if a defendant raises a free speech defense, the court decides its validity as a matter of law.⁴

Penalties by Classification

Each harassment offense in Arkansas falls into a criminal classification that carries its own sentencing range:⁵⁶

Class B misdemeanor (standard cyberbullying): up to 90 days in jail and a fine of up to $1,000.
Class A misdemeanor (harassment, harassing communications, third-degree stalking, cyberbullying of a school employee): up to one year in jail and a fine of up to $2,500.
Class C felony (second-degree stalking): three to ten years in prison and a fine of up to $10,000.
Class B felony (first-degree stalking): five to twenty years in prison and a fine of up to $15,000.

The line between a misdemeanor and a felony conviction is where the real weight lands. A misdemeanor means county jail time. A felony means state prison, and the collateral consequences that follow a felony record change what the rest of a person’s life looks like.

Defenses Built Into the Statutes

The harassment statute contains an affirmative defense for people conducting surveillance as part of their job. Law enforcement officers, licensed private investigators, attorneys, process servers, licensed bail bondsmen, and store detectives acting within the reasonable scope of their duties on an official work assignment cannot be prosecuted under the harassment statute for that surveillance.¹

The statute also states that nothing in the harassment law limits free speech, picketing on public property or on private property with permission, or any other constitutionally protected activity.¹ The stalking statute carries the same exclusion.⁴ Protests, journalism, and political speech generally cannot form the basis of a harassment or stalking prosecution, even when the target finds the attention unwelcome.

The “without good cause” and “no legitimate purpose” language inside the harassment statute gives defendants further room to argue. A landlord checking on a property, a parent waiting outside a school, or a creditor making reasonable collection calls may have a legitimate purpose that defeats a harassment charge, even where the other person felt harassed.

No-Contact Orders and Orders of Protection

When a judge releases a harassment defendant on pretrial bail, the court must issue a written no-contact order. That order stays in effect even if the defendant appeals a conviction, and the court gives a copy to both the victim and the arresting agency. Violating that no-contact order creates a separate legal problem for the defendant, on top of the underlying charge.¹

A victim can also pursue a civil order of protection under the Domestic Abuse Act of 1991 (Arkansas Code 9-15-101 et seq.), separate from the criminal process. Family members, household members, and people in a dating relationship with the respondent generally qualify to petition. Victims of stalking or sexual assault may petition regardless of their relationship to the offender. When the petition alleges an immediate and present danger of domestic abuse, the court can grant an ex parte temporary order without the respondent present, and that temporary order can exclude the abuser from a shared home, prohibit contact, award temporary custody, and order temporary financial support until a full hearing.⁷

Violating an order of protection is its own crime under Arkansas Code 5-53-134. A first violation is a Class A misdemeanor, carrying up to one year in jail and a fine of up to $2,500. If the person violates another order of protection within five years of a prior conviction for the same offense, the charge becomes a Class D felony, punishable by up to six years in prison and a fine of up to $10,000.⁸⁶

When Federal Law Steps In

Harassment that crosses state lines or uses interstate communication tools can trigger federal jurisdiction. Under 18 U.S.C. § 2261A, federal stalking covers traveling between states or using the mail, internet, or any other interstate communication tool with the intent to kill, injure, harass, or intimidate another person, when the conduct places the victim in reasonable fear of death or serious bodily injury or causes substantial emotional distress. The statute protects not only the direct victim but also immediate family members, spouses, intimate partners, and even pets and service animals.⁹

A federal conviction under this section is a felony, with penalties set by 18 U.S.C. § 2261(b) that can include up to five years in federal prison. Federal prosecution typically requires a course of conduct rather than a single incident, and the interstate or electronic commerce element has to be present for federal jurisdiction to attach. For someone in Arkansas, this most often becomes an issue when the harassment involves online platforms, calls or texts to someone in another state, or physical travel across state lines.

Consequences Beyond the Sentence

A harassment conviction can carry weight past the day the sentence ends. Three areas most often catch people by surprise.

Firearms. Under the Lautenberg Amendment to federal law, anyone convicted of a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence is prohibited from shipping, transporting, possessing, or receiving firearms or ammunition.¹⁰ If the harassment involved a family member, household member, or dating partner, a Class A misdemeanor harassment conviction can trigger the federal ban, regardless of how Arkansas labels the offense.

Record sealing. Arkansas lets a person petition to seal certain criminal records after finishing all terms of the sentence, including probation and fines. Misdemeanor harassment carries no mandatory waiting period, so a person may be eligible to petition immediately after finishing their sentence. Many felony-level stalking convictions (Class A or Class B felonies that are not drug offenses) cannot be sealed at all.

Professional licensing. State licensing boards for healthcare workers, teachers, and other regulated professions evaluate criminal history when issuing, renewing, or revoking a license. Boards that oversee work with vulnerable populations tend to scrutinize harassment and stalking convictions closely, and many require self-reporting an arrest or conviction. Failing to report can become a separate disciplinary matter.

1
Justia. Arkansas Code 5-71-208 – Harassment
2
Justia. Arkansas Code 5-71-209 – Harassing Communications
3
Justia. Arkansas Code 5-71-217 – Cyberbullying
4
Justia. Arkansas Code 5-71-229 – Stalking
5
Justia. Arkansas Code 5-4-401 – Sentence
6
Justia. Arkansas Code 5-4-201 – Fines – Limitations on Amount
7
Justia. Arkansas Code 9-15-206 – Temporary Order
8
Justia. Arkansas Code 5-53-134 – Violation of an Order of Protection
9
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 2261A – Stalking
10
U.S. Marshals Service. Lautenberg Amendment