What is a class B felony?

The decoder: same letter, different worlds.

Felony classification is state-specific alphabet soup. New York’s ladder runs A (murder territory, life exposure) through E; class B covers up to 25 years - violent Bs like first-degree robbery and burglary carry 5-to-25 with mandatory minimums, drug Bs (major trafficking counts) run determinate terms up to 25. Washington’s B tops at 10 years. Alabama’s B runs 2-to-20. The federal system letters offenses by maximum: a Class B federal felony means a statutory max of 25 years or more but less than life. Kentucky, Missouri, Tennessee, and the rest each keep their own chart. Reading a charge sheet starts with which code it cites.

The New York class B, since that is the famous one.

In New York practice, class B felonies split into violent and non-violent tracks. Violent Bs (PL 70.02): first-degree robbery, burglary, and assault-family counts - determinate sentences of 5 to 25 years with post-release supervision, mandatory prison for most, and predicate-felon enhancements that raise floors fast. Non-violent Bs (70.00): indeterminate sentences up to 8⅓-to-25, with probation-eligible outcomes possible for first offenders on some counts. Drug Bs post-2009 reform carry determinate 1-to-9 for first offenders - the Rockefeller era’s life sentences are gone. The plea architecture matters: B-to-C and B-to-D reductions are the daily work of New York felony practice, and each letter down moves years.

Charged with one, anywhere.

A class B charge - any jurisdiction’s version - is a serious-felony prosecution with mandatory-minimum texture, predicate-offender math, and immigration and licensing consequences baked in. The response is uniform: no statements, counsel who practices in that specific code, and early attention to the classification fights (violent versus non-violent designation, predicate status, charge-reduction architecture) that decide more than trials do. This firm works both alphabets - state and federal - and the first read of a charge sheet is free.

THE AUTHOR

Todd A. Spodek

Managing partner. Second-generation federal defense lawyer - the Netflix defense, the Fox and CNN analyst chair, and two decades of federal courtrooms.

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