The Statute of Limitations in Florida — Statute 775.15, and How It Differs From Speedy Trial

The statute of limitations decides how long the State has to charge you. Speedy trial decides how long it has to try you once it does. People mix them up constantly — including people sitting in a lawyer’s office asking why their “expired” case is still alive. This guide walks through Florida Statute 775.15, the exceptions that swallow its rules, and exactly where the statute of limitations ends and speedy trial begins.

Start with the basic answer. Under Florida Statute 775.15, the State must commence a prosecution within a fixed window that depends on the level of the charge — and if it misses that window, the case is barred forever. That is the statute of limitations, and it is a different animal from speedy trial, which only starts mattering after you have been charged. One clock runs from the crime to the charge. The other runs from the charge to the trial. Confuse them and you will misread your own case.

How long does the State have to charge?

Section 775.15(2) sets the default ladder: a first-degree felony must be commenced within 4 years after it is committed; any other felony, within 3 years; a first-degree misdemeanor, within 2 years; a second-degree misdemeanor or noncriminal violation, within 1 year. And under section 775.15(1), there is no time limit at all for a capital felony, a life felony, or any felony that resulted in a death — those prosecutions may be commenced at any time.

Under section 775.15(3), the offense is “committed” when every element has occurred, and the clock starts the day after. For continuing offenses — schemes, ongoing courses of conduct — the clock does not start until the course of conduct ends.

What does “commenced” actually mean? (The trap in subsection (4))

Here is the nuance that decides real cases. Filing the charging document is not always enough. Under section 775.15(4)(b), when a defendant has not previously been arrested or served with a summons, the prosecution is commenced when the indictment or information is filed and the capias, summons, or other process issued on it “is executed without unreasonable delay.” The State can file an information on the last day of the window, but if it then sits on the warrant for years without a diligent effort to find you, the prosecution can be barred even though the paperwork was technically on time. This is so because the statute protects you from stale prosecutions, not just stale filings.

The statute builds in the counterweights: an inability to locate you after diligent search, or your absence from the state, count in the State’s favor on reasonableness. Under section 775.15(5), the clock also stops entirely while you are continuously absent from Florida or have no reasonably ascertainable home or job here — but that tolling is capped at 3 years. And if a timely-filed charging document is later dismissed for a defect in form or content, section 775.15(4)(c) hands the State 3 extra months to refile.

The exceptions that swallow the rule

Section 775.15 does not stop at subsection (5) — it runs to subsection (22), and the exceptions do heavy lifting. The ones that come up most:

Death and capital cases. No limitation, ever — section 775.15(1).

Sexual battery. The modern rule is broad: for a violation of section 794.011 committed on or after July 1, 2020, against a victim younger than 18, prosecution may be commenced at any time — section 775.15(20). Earlier windows have their own layered rules in subsections (13) and (14), including any-time prosecution where the offense was reported within 72 hours, and an 8-year window for first- and second-degree felony sexual battery against victims 16 or older. Which rule applies depends on when the offense happened, because an already-expired limitation period cannot be revived.

DNA identification. Under subsections (15) and (16), when DNA analysis establishes the accused’s identity, prosecution for listed offenses — sexual battery, aggravated battery, kidnapping, burglary, robbery, carjacking, aggravated child abuse, and others — may be commenced beyond the ordinary window, in the subsection (16) list at any time after the identification, provided the tested evidence is preserved and available for testing by the accused.

Fraud and breach of fiduciary duty. Under section 775.15(12)(a), the window can extend to 1 year after the aggrieved party discovers the offense, capped at 3 extra years — the “discovery” extension that keeps economic-crime cases alive long after the transaction. Public officials get their own rule: misconduct in office can be charged any time while the defendant holds office and up to 2 years after leaving it, section 775.15(12)(b).

Human trafficking (s. 787.06): any time — subsection (19). Destructive-device felonies causing injury: 10 years — subsection (7). Digital voyeurism: 1 year from the victim’s actual knowledge of the recording or its confiscation by law enforcement, whichever comes first — subsection (17), a 2024-era addition alongside the sexual-cyberharassment windows in subsection (22).

One constitutional backstop cuts the other way: once a limitation period has fully expired, the Legislature cannot revive it. The United States Supreme Court held in Stogner v. California, 539 U.S. 607 (2003), that resurrecting a time-barred prosecution violates the Ex Post Facto Clause. That is why nearly every exception in section 775.15 carries a “does not apply to offenses already barred” proviso.

Statute of limitations vs. speedy trial: the clean distinction

Now the distinction this article exists to draw. The statute of limitations governs the time before prosecution — from the offense to the commencement of the case. Speedy trial governs the time after — from charge to trial. They come from different sources, run on different clocks, and carry very different remedies.

Florida’s speedy trial machinery lives in Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.191 (backed by section 918.015, which declares the right and lets the Supreme Court implement it by rule). Under the rule as reworked effective July 1, 2025, the State generally must bring a misdemeanor to trial within 90 days and a felony within 175 days, measured from the filing of formal charges — and a defendant who is ready can file a demand for a faster setting. But expiration does not end the case by itself: the defendant must file a notice of expiration, the court then has a recapture window of 30 days to bring the case to trial, and a discharge under the rule is now generally without prejudice unless the constitutional speedy trial right was violated.

Put the two side by side and the difference is stark. A statute-of-limitations bar is substantive and final — if the State commenced prosecution too late, the charge dies and cannot come back. A rule 3.191 discharge is procedural — powerful leverage, but after the 2025 amendments usually not a permanent bar. The statute of limitations cannot be extended by a prosecutor’s diligence once it has run; the speedy trial clock, by contrast, is full of exceptions, extensions, and waivers — and you can waive it yourself without ever realizing, because routine defense continuances toll it. One more asymmetry worth knowing: the limitations defense belongs to you, and it is not self-executing. It must be raised, and it can be waived.

What this means if you are staring at an old case

If you have just learned about an old warrant or a charge from years ago, the questions that matter are precise ones: What was the charge level, and which window in section 775.15 applies? When was the information actually filed? Was the capias executed without unreasonable delay, or did it sit? Were you in Florida the whole time? Does an exception — DNA, discovery-of-fraud, a victim-age rule — reach the case? Those answers, pulled from the court file and the statute in effect on the offense date, decide whether the case is legally dead or very much alive. If the case is already past charging and moving slowly, the analysis shifts to rule 3.191 and, in extreme delay, the constitutional speedy trial factors. Different clock, different fight — and occasionally, in the space between them, a case the State simply waited too long to bring. For cases where every clock has run and a conviction already exists, the road is different again: postconviction relief under Rule 3.850.

Legally reviewed by Tonmiel Rodriguez · Last reviewed July 2026

Tonmiel Rodriguez is a criminal defense attorney in Bartow, Florida, and is Board Certified in Criminal Trial Law by The Florida Bar. If you are dealing with an old charge, an unserved warrant, or a case that seems to have outrun its clock in Polk, Highlands, or Hardee County, call The Rodriguez Law Office at (863) 774-4556.