How much jail time can I get for federal larceny?
Ten years is the statutory ceiling when the property tops $1,000 - but your actual number comes off the § 2B1.1 loss table, and the table is where federal theft sentences are really decided. The honest math.
What makes larceny federal.
Theft becomes federal through the victim or the venue: 18 U.S.C. § 641 covers theft of government money or property (the workhorse - covering everything from stolen equipment to fraudulent benefit retention), § 661 covers larceny within federal jurisdiction (bases, parks, vessels), § 2113(b) covers bank larceny, and theft from interstate shipments has its own section. The grading is uniform: over $1,000, a felony with a ten-year maximum; $1,000 or under, a misdemeanor capped at one year. Postal theft, museum theft, and tribal-lands theft all have parallel provisions - the federal code protects its own property with specificity.
The real math: the loss table.
Statutory maximums are ceilings nobody hits; guidelines are the floor everyone negotiates from. Federal theft runs through U.S.S.G. § 2B1.1: base level 6 (or 7 where the statutory max is 20+), plus loss-table steps - $6,500 adds 2 levels, $15,000 adds 4, $95,000 adds 8, $550,000 adds 14 - plus enhancements for sophisticated means, abuse of trust (the government-employee cases), and more than ten victims. Translated: a first offender who took $20,000 of government property sits around level 10-12 - a guideline range measured in months, probation-eligible with acceptance of responsibility; a $600,000 scheme with trust abuse sits near level 22 - forty-plus months before variances. Restitution is mandatory and independent of the sentence.
Where the number gets moved.
Loss is litigable: intended versus actual loss, offsets for value returned, and the government’s aggregation math all move levels - and levels are months. Intent is litigable: § 641 requires knowing conversion, and benefit-overpayment cases (the biggest § 641 category) frequently involve agency error and honest confusion rather than theft. And disposition architecture matters: pretrial diversion exists in federal practice for the right first-offense profile, misdemeanor resolutions under the $1,000 line are negotiable when valuation wobbles, and restitution-first postures change charging decisions. Get counsel before the interview - most § 641 defendants talked to agents first and negotiated second, in the wrong order.
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