Malicious Mischief Could Come with a Felony Charge
Video Transcribed: My name is Stuart Ericson and I am an attorney in Wagoner. We are continuing to talk about property crimes.
One of our other property crimes in Oklahoma is malicious mischief, which sounds kind of funny in old school, but really it’s essentially like a vandalism statute. This is injury or damage to property. So examples of malicious mischief would be maybe throwing a rock through a window on purpose and breaking the window, going by a car and keying the car, or slashing the tire, that is absolutely vandalism or malicious mischief. A lot of times it’s just out of just wanting to do it. Sometimes it’s a revenge thing. I’ve seen that many times, ex-boyfriends or ex-girlfriends will go cause damage just out of spite. But it is a crime.
But of course, the intent has to be proven that it’s not an accident, that it’s intended to cause that damage, and that there is some malicious intent. So again, not accidental damage. Again, mainly this crime is a misdemeanor if it’s less than $1,000 worth of damage. But if it’s more than 1,000, it will be a felony. So this is one of the other property crimes that people could be charged with within the state of Oklahoma and have to defend. So again, a defense of this would be if it were an accident or during some sort of construction event or who knows what. But for every criminal offense and charge, there are always fact issues that need to be looked at and need to be resolved before deciding how to go forward on any criminal defense case.
So if you have any questions, reach out to me, a criminal defense lawyer in Wagoner County, at stuartericson@wagonerlawyer.com.
