Legal Information: North Carolina

State Gun Laws

Updated: 
February 14, 2022

What is the definition of a felony?

Throughout these gun law pages, we will refer to laws that make it illegal for someone convicted of a felony to have a gun.  In North Carolina, a felony is any offense that is punishable by a prison sentence of more than one year in the state prison or a death sentence.1   However, you cannot always tell if someone was convicted of a felony only by looking at the amount of time s/he actually served in prison since sentences are often reduced or pled down. If you are unsure if the abuser was convicted of a felony, you might want to talk to the prosecutor who handled the criminal case against the abuser to find out or go to the courthouse where s/he was convicted and search the conviction records.

For information on how a felony is defined under federal law, please see the Federal Gun Laws page.

1 NCGS § 14-1

Legal Information

WomensLaw serves and supports all survivors, no matter their sex or gender.

© 2008–2023 WomensLaw.org is a project of the National Network to End Domestic Violence, Inc. All rights reserved. This website is funded in part through a grant from the Office for Victims of Crime, Office of Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice. Neither the U.S. Department of Justice nor any of its components operate, control, are responsible for, or necessarily endorse, this website (including, without limitation, its content, technical infrastructure, and policies, and any services or tools provided). NNEDV is a 501©(3) non-profit organization; EIN 52-1973408.