What Is Considered Harassment in Texas: Conduct, Intent, and Penalties

Under Texas Penal Code § 42.07, harassment is intentional conduct meant to harass, annoy, alarm, torment, or embarrass another person, carried out through specific acts the statute lists: obscene communications, threats of injury, false reports of death or serious harm, and repeated or anonymous contact. What is considered harassment in Texas depends on both the type of act and the intent behind it, and the law treats texts, direct messages, and emails the same as phone calls. A single incident is usually a misdemeanor. A pattern can become felony stalking.¹

The Conduct the Law Covers

Not every unpleasant exchange is criminal. The statute names the categories of conduct that qualify, and prosecutors have to fit the behavior into one of them.

Obscene Communications

Initiating communication and making an obscene comment, request, or suggestion is harassment. “Obscene” is narrow here: it means graphic descriptions of sexual acts or excretory functions that are patently offensive.¹ Rude or vulgar language on its own doesn’t necessarily meet the standard.

Threats

Threatening to injure someone, or to commit a felony against them, their family, or their property, qualifies when the threat is made in a way reasonably likely to alarm the person receiving it.¹ The threat does not have to be acted on. Sending it with the right intent is enough.

False Reports of Death or Serious Injury

Telling someone that a person they care about has died or been seriously hurt, knowing it’s false and doing it to alarm them, is a separate violation.¹

Repeated or Anonymous Calls

Making someone’s phone ring repeatedly, calling anonymously, or calling and refusing to hang up all count when done with the required intent. Letting someone else use your phone for any of these acts, if you knowingly permit it, also exposes you to charges.¹

Texts, DMs, and Social Media Count the Same as Phone Calls

The statute defines “electronic communication” to include email, text messages, social media platforms, internet-based tools, and any transfer of data through a wire or electromagnetic system.¹ The legislature wrote modern platforms directly into the law, so courts don’t have to stretch an old phone statute to reach them.

Repeated unwanted direct messages on Instagram are treated like repeated anonymous phone calls. A threat of bodily harm posted on someone’s social media page meets the same test as the same threat spoken over a call. What matters is the substance and the intent, not the app.

The Intent Requirement

Every harassment charge has to clear an intent threshold: the person acted with the deliberate purpose to harass, annoy, alarm, torment, or embarrass the other person. An awkward text or a joke that landed badly isn’t a crime.

Intent is usually proved through context. Prosecutors look at the pattern of behavior, the language used, the relationship between the parties, and whether the sender kept going after being told to stop. One angry voicemail during a fight reads differently than twenty voicemails over three days to someone who has gone silent.

When It Becomes Stalking

This is the point where penalties jump. If the conduct forms a pattern directed at the same person rather than a single incident, Texas can charge it as stalking under Penal Code § 42.072, which is a felony.²

Three elements have to line up. The person must engage in conduct on more than one occasion as part of the same course of behavior aimed at a specific individual. The conduct must either qualify as harassment under § 42.07 or involve behavior the person knows or should know the target will see as threatening. And the conduct must actually cause the target to feel afraid or harassed, with a reasonable person in the same situation feeling the same way.²

Different acts can be combined to show the pattern. Threatening texts on Monday and an uninvited appearance at someone’s workplace on Wednesday can form a single course of conduct even though the acts themselves are different.

Penalties

A standard harassment conviction is a Class B misdemeanor, punishable by up to 180 days in county jail, a fine of up to $2,000, or both.³

The charge becomes a Class A misdemeanor if the person has a prior harassment conviction, which carries up to one year in county jail and a fine of up to $4,000.¹⁴ Enhancements can also apply when the offense involved certain electronic communications and the defendant had previously violated a restraining order or injunction.

Stalking is a third-degree felony, carrying 2 to 10 years in state prison and a fine of up to $10,000. A prior stalking conviction (Texas, another state, or federal) raises it to a second-degree felony, with 2 to 20 years in prison and the same $10,000 maximum fine.² The distance between a $2,000 misdemeanor and a decade in prison is the distance between one harassing phone call and a pattern of the same behavior.

Protective Orders

Victims of stalking can seek a protective order through the courts under Chapter 7B of the Code of Criminal Procedure. The victim, a parent or guardian of a minor victim, or a prosecuting attorney can file in the county where the victim lives, where the offender lives, or where the offense occurred.⁵

If the court finds a clear and present danger, it can issue a temporary emergency order without notifying the alleged offender. After a full hearing where both sides can present their case, the court decides whether to issue a final order. The order can require the offender to stay away from the victim’s home, workplace, and school, and prohibit all contact with the victim and their family.

Protective orders typically last up to two years. Courts can extend them longer when the offender caused serious injury or was the subject of multiple prior orders protecting the same person, and in stalking cases the order can potentially last for the lifetime of both parties.⁵ Violating a protective order is itself a crime and can enhance future harassment charges.

When Federal Law Also Applies

If harassing conduct crosses state lines or uses interstate communication tools like the internet, federal cyberstalking law can apply alongside Texas law. Under 18 U.S.C. § 2261A, it’s a federal crime to use the mail, an interactive computer service, or any electronic communication system in interstate commerce to engage in a course of conduct that places someone in reasonable fear of death or serious injury, or causes substantial emotional distress to the victim or their immediate family.⁶ A single harassing email generally won’t trigger federal jurisdiction, but sustained online targeting of someone in another state can. Federal penalties can include years of federal imprisonment.

Workplace Harassment Is a Different Track

If your situation involves a coworker or supervisor at work, criminal harassment law is probably not the right frame. Workplace harassment is a civil matter under federal anti-discrimination law, mainly Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, and becomes unlawful when unwelcome conduct based on a protected characteristic like race, sex, religion, or national origin is severe or pervasive enough to create a hostile environment.⁷ Remedies run through your employer’s complaint process and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, not through the criminal courts.

If You’re Being Harassed

Start building a record immediately. Save every text, voicemail, email, and social media message. Screenshot conversations before the sender can delete them. Note the date, time, and content of phone calls, including whether they come from blocked or unknown numbers. If your carrier offers call logs, request them. This documentation is the foundation of any criminal case or protective order application.

File a police report. Many Texas police departments accept reports for harassing communications online or by phone, and you’ll receive a report number to reference later. Bring your documentation when you file. The clearer the pattern you can show, the more seriously the complaint will be treated. After filing, contact your phone carrier with the report number if calls or texts are involved; carriers can sometimes assist with tracing or blocking.

If the behavior is escalating or you feel physically threatened, consider applying for a protective order through your local court. You don’t need an attorney to apply, though having one helps. If the harassment involves someone contacting you from another state or targeting you online from elsewhere, tell law enforcement, because federal jurisdiction may open. And try not to engage with the harasser. Responding, even to tell them to stop, can sometimes be used to argue the communication was mutual rather than one-sided.

1
State of Texas. Texas Penal Code 42.07 – Harassment
2
State of Texas. Texas Penal Code 42.072 – Stalking
3
State of Texas. Texas Penal Code 12.22 – Class B Misdemeanor
4
State of Texas. Texas Penal Code 12.21 – Class A Misdemeanor
5
Texas State Law Library. Protective Orders – Getting an Order
6
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 2261A – Stalking
7
U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Harassment