Crimes against persons
Homicide, assault and family violence, threats and stalking, restraint and kidnapping, trafficking, sexual offenses and robbery under SAPC Chapters 19 to 22 and 29, with the First Amendment limits on threat prosecutions.
Required for Class A Class B Class C Class F
The exam draws 30 questions from a bank of 58. You have 45 minutes, and you need 80% to pass. Questions apply the law to situations. To prepare, read this guide alongside the cited sections of the San Andreas codes, the 2026 Law Enforcement Reform Package and the federal authorities below. The U.S. Constitution binds every San Andreas officer. Supreme Court decisions are binding; federal circuit decisions are accepted authority, and where circuits differ the academy teaches the rule that protects rights more.
Crimes against persons are graded by three things the officer must pin down at the scene: the actor's mental state, the harm caused, and any circumstance the statute makes an element, such as a weapon, the victim's status or the relationship between the parties. Most grades turn on the Chapter 1 definitions. Bodily injury (SAPC §1.40) is pain, illness or any impairment, however slight. Serious bodily injury (§1.41) creates a substantial risk of death or causes death, serious permanent disfigurement, or protracted loss or impairment of a bodily member or organ. A deadly weapon (§1.43) includes a firearm and anything capable of causing death or serious bodily injury in the manner of its use, including a motor vehicle. A family or household member (§1.34) includes a spouse or former spouse, a parent or child, a relative by blood or marriage, a current or former dating partner, and a current or former member of the household. An elderly person is 65 or older (§1.35); a disabled person has a condition that substantially impairs the ability to protect or care for themselves (§1.36). A charge is best supported when the officer can point to evidence for every element, including the one that raises the grade: medical findings, photographs, the weapon, proof of the relationship, the victim's age, and what the suspect knew.
Homicide follows the mental state. Murder (SAPC §19.01, 1st Degree Felony) is intentionally or knowingly causing death, or intending serious bodily injury and committing an act clearly dangerous to human life that causes death. A suspect who beat a man about the head with a bat intending 'only' to fracture his skull has committed murder if the victim dies. Sudden passion arising from adequate cause is raised by the defendant at punishment, where it can reduce the punishment to the 2nd Degree range; the officer does not reduce the charge. Manslaughter (§19.02, 2nd Degree) is a reckless killing: the actor perceived a substantial and unjustifiable risk of death and consciously disregarded it. Criminally Negligent Homicide (§19.03, State Jail Felony) is a death caused by criminal negligence: the actor ought to have been aware of a substantial and unjustifiable risk of death, and the failure to perceive it is a gross deviation from the ordinary standard of care. Vehicle deaths have their own sections: Vehicular Homicide (Reckless) (§19.13) and Vehicular Manslaughter (§19.19, criminally negligent or reckless operation) are 2nd Degree Felonies, so a reckless driving death fits both, and a death caused by intoxicated operation is charged as Intoxication Manslaughter under SATC §49V.06. Aiding Suicide (§19.18) is a Class C Misdemeanor at its base grade and is enhanced to a felony grade where the actor's conduct causes the death, or a suicide attempt resulting in serious bodily injury.
Capital Murder requires a murder under §19.01 plus a statutory aggravator. The aggravators are: more than one victim in the same transaction or scheme (§19.04); a victim the actor knows is a peace officer or firefighter acting in the lawful discharge of duty (§19.05), where the knowledge is itself an element; an intentional murder during kidnapping, burglary, robbery, aggravated sexual assault, arson or terroristic conduct (§19.06); murder for remuneration, which makes both the payer and the killer principals (§19.07); a victim younger than 10 (§19.08); a correctional officer or jailer, or a murder committed while the actor is in custody (§19.09); and retaliation against, or prevention of, a witness or informant (§19.10). Drive-By Shooting Resulting in Death (§19.17) is also a Capital Felony. Felony Murder (§19.11, 1st Degree) is different from §19.06: it needs no intent to kill. A person who, in the course and furtherance of any felony other than manslaughter, or in immediate flight from it, commits an act clearly dangerous to human life that causes a death commits felony murder; the intent to commit the underlying felony supplies the mental state. A robber who fires a warning shot during his escape that kills a bystander fits §19.11; a robber who deliberately executes the clerk fits §19.06. Murder of an Unborn Child (§19.12) covers an intentional or knowing killing of an unborn child by an act directed at the pregnant person or the child.
The assault family is a ladder. At the bottom, Simple Assault (Threat Only) (SAPC §22.01, Class C) is an intentional or knowing threat of imminent bodily injury by word, gesture or display that places the person in reasonable apprehension of immediate harm, with no contact; Offensive Physical Contact Without Injury (§22.11, Class C) covers a shove, unwanted grab or similar contact the actor knows or reasonably should believe the other will regard as offensive or provocative, where no bodily injury results. Assault Causing Bodily Injury (§22.02, Class A) requires bodily injury caused intentionally, knowingly or recklessly. Aggravated Assault with a Deadly Weapon (§22.05, 2nd Degree) is an assault under §22.02 during which the actor uses or exhibits a deadly weapon; displaying or brandishing it to facilitate the assault is enough, whether or not it discharges or makes contact. Aggravated Assault (Serious Bodily Injury) (§22.06, 2nd Degree) turns on the gravity of the injury, not the instrument, and can be committed recklessly. Aggravated Assault by Caustic Substance (§22.21) is a 1st Degree Felony. Firearms have separate deadly-conduct offenses: knowingly pointing a firearm at or toward a person, loaded or not (§38.58, Class A), and knowingly discharging one at or toward people (§38.57, 3rd Degree). Mob Assault (§22.22) makes each participant in a group assault criminally responsible, and Hate Crime Assault (§22.23, 3rd Degree) requires proof that the victim was selected because of bias.
Protected-victim statutes raise the grade when the actor knows the victim's status. Assault on a Public Servant (SAPC §22.03, 3rd Degree) is an assault under §22.02 on a person the actor knows is a public servant, including a peace officer, while lawfully discharging an official duty or in retaliation for one; a uniform, badge, marked vehicle or verbal identification is sufficient to establish knowledge. Aggravated Assault on a Peace Officer (§22.07, 1st Degree) combines §22.05 or §22.06 with a victim known to be a peace officer or emergency services personnel. Separate sections protect emergency services personnel (§22.13, 3rd Degree), healthcare workers in a facility or while rendering care (§22.14, 3rd Degree), licensed security officers on protected premises (§22.15, Class A), transit workers (§22.16, Class A), elderly or disabled persons (§22.10, 3rd Degree), where the actor need only know the circumstances that make the victim protected, and a person the actor knows is pregnant (§22.19, 3rd Degree). Correctional officers have their own assault sections in Chapter 38C (§38C.17 and §38C.18). Causing blood, saliva or other bodily fluid to contact a public servant, with intent to harass, alarm or expose, is a State Jail Felony (§22.20). Because knowledge is an element, the report should record what told the suspect who the victim was: the uniform, the announcement, the marked unit, the hospital badge.
Family violence carries its own sections. Domestic Violence (Bodily Injury) (SAPC §22.08) is causing bodily injury to a family or household member or dating partner; the relationship is an element, and a first offense is a Class A Misdemeanor. A domestic assault after a prior family-violence conviction, or a prior strangulation conviction, is Repeat Domestic Violence (§22.09, 3rd Degree); the prior conviction is an element, so the officer confirms it through records. Impeding the normal breathing or blood circulation of a family or household member by pressure on the throat or neck, or by blocking the nose or mouth, is Assault by Strangulation or Suffocation (§22.04, 3rd Degree); loss of consciousness is not required, and impairment however brief completes the offense. Two or more family-violence assaults within 12 months or less are Continuous Family Violence (§22.24, 3rd Degree). Administering poison to a family member's food, drink or medication with intent to cause illness or injury is Domestic Poisoning (§22.82). Strangulation of a person who is not a family or household member is also an offense; the code lists two non-family entries (§22.25, a State Jail Felony, and §22.83, a 2nd Degree Felony requiring intent), so confirm the charge with the prosecutor. The physical signs of strangulation are often faint, so officers ask directly about pressure on the neck, record voice changes, difficulty swallowing, petechiae and marks, and photograph them.
Children and dependent adults have specific protections. Child Abuse (Bodily Injury) (SAPC §22.42, 3rd Degree) is causing bodily injury to a child younger than 15 intentionally, knowingly or recklessly; Child Abuse (Serious Bodily Injury) (§22.43, 1st Degree) requires intent or knowledge; Child Abuse Resulting in Death (§22.44) is a Capital Felony. A person with custody of a child younger than 15 who abandons the child or leaves the child where it is exposed to an unreasonable risk of harm commits Abandonment or Endangering a Child (§22.41, State Jail Felony). Leaving a child younger than seven in a vehicle for longer than five minutes without a supervising adult is a Class C Misdemeanor (§22.45), but a State Jail Felony if the child suffers bodily injury from heat, cold or other conditions (§22.46). Child Neglect (§22.47) is omitting necessary care by a person with a legal duty. Law enforcement officers are mandatory reporters of child abuse (§22.50). For elderly or disabled victims, abuse causing bodily injury is a 3rd Degree Felony (§22.62), serious bodily injury a 2nd Degree Felony (§22.63), and death a 1st Degree Felony (§22.64); neglect by a person with a legal duty of care is §22.66.
Threats are crimes when the statute's elements and the First Amendment both permit it. True threats, statements meant to communicate a serious intent to commit unlawful violence, are unprotected (Virginia v. Black), and Counterman v. Colorado requires proof that the speaker at least recklessly disregarded that the words would be seen as threatening violence. Angry hyperbole and political venting are not enough. Terroristic Threat (SAPC §22.29, Class A) is a threat to commit any offense involving violence to a person or property, with intent to place a person in fear of imminent serious bodily injury, to cause evacuation or interruption of a building, assembly or public service, or to place the public or a substantial group in fear; the ability or intent to carry it out is not an element. Simple Assault (§22.01) covers an imminent threat; a conditional threat of future harm is charged under §22.29. Death Threats Against a Specific Person (§19.16, State Jail Felony) is knowingly communicating a threat to kill an identifiable individual under circumstances that would make a reasonable person fear it will be carried out; the actor need not intend to carry it out. Threats against a public servant to influence or retaliate for official duty are §22.30 (3rd Degree), against a public official or that official's family §22.36, and threats of mass violence against a school, place of worship, workplace or public event §22.35 (2nd Degree). Written threats delivered physically with intent to intimidate or extort are §22.40.
Stalking (SAPC §22.26, Class A) requires conduct on more than one occasion, as part of the same scheme or course of conduct directed at a specific person, that the actor knows or reasonably should know will place that person in fear of bodily injury or death, or fear for the safety of family, household or property, and that would cause a reasonable person such fear. Aggravated Stalking (§22.27, 3rd Degree) is stalking in violation of a protective order, while possessing a deadly weapon, after a prior stalking conviction, or causing serious bodily injury or serious mental impairment. Knowingly violating a protective or anti-stalking order after service or actual notice, by contacting, approaching or surveilling the protected person, is §22.38 (State Jail Felony). Harassment (§22.28, Class B) requires intent to harass, annoy, alarm, abuse, torment or embarrass, shown through repeated communications, obscene or threatening communications, a false report of injury or death, or causing a device to ring repeatedly. Electronic courses of conduct may also be Cyberstalking (§33.22). Secretly installing a GPS tracker on another's vehicle to follow them is §22.32 (Class A). Officers build stalking cases on the pattern: a dated log of each incident, screenshots, call records, witnesses, and the victim's account of why each act caused fear.
Restraint offenses form their own ladder. Unlawful Restraint (SAPC §20.01, Class A) is intentionally or knowingly restricting a person's movements without effective consent so as to interfere substantially with liberty, by moving or confining them; restraint of a child younger than 14 is without consent if done without the parent's or guardian's consent. False Imprisonment (§20.05, Class A) is knowingly and unlawfully confining a person against their will without legal authority, however briefly. The shopkeeper's privilege (§9.14) justifies a merchant only in detaining a suspected shoplifter in a reasonable manner and for a reasonable time to investigate the merchandise or summon a peace officer; an unreasonable detention forfeits it and may be false imprisonment. Kidnapping (§20.02, 3rd Degree) is abduction: restraint with intent to prevent liberation either by secreting or holding the person where they are not likely to be found, or by using or threatening deadly force. Aggravated Kidnapping (§20.03, 1st Degree) is abduction with intent to hold for ransom or reward, use as a shield or hostage, facilitate a felony or flight from one, inflict bodily injury or sexual abuse, terrorize, or interfere with a governmental or political function, or abduction during which the actor uses or exhibits a deadly weapon; §20.04 applies when the victim is a child. Hostage Taking (§20.06, 1st Degree) is seizing or detaining a person and threatening to kill, injure or keep holding them to compel a third person, government or the public to act. A parent who takes or conceals a child in violation of a custody order or another's custodial rights, intending to deprive the custodian of access, commits Parental Kidnapping (§20.09, State Jail Felony).
Trafficking is exploitation, not movement. Human Trafficking for Forced Labor (SAPC §20A.08, 2nd Degree) requires trafficking a person and, by force, fraud or coercion, causing forced labor or services. Human Trafficking for Sexual Exploitation (§20A.09, 1st Degree) requires trafficking a person and by any means causing commercial sex acts. Human Trafficking of a Child (§20A.10, 1st Degree, 25 to 99 years) applies to a child younger than 18 whether or not force, fraud or coercion is used. Slavery and Involuntary Servitude (§20.07, 1st Degree) covers forced labor by force, threat, coercion, abuse of legal process, debt bondage, or destroying, concealing or confiscating documents, and consent obtained by those means is not effective. Coercion (§1.60) includes threats to accuse a person of an offense or to take official action. Compelling Prostitution by force, threat or fraud is §22.76 (2nd Degree), and causing a minor to engage in prostitution §22.77 (1st Degree). Smuggling of Persons (§22.73) is a different offense: transporting or concealing a person in violation of immigration laws or without consent. A San Andreas officer enforces state law; unlawful presence alone is not a crime and does not justify a stop or arrest by state officers (Melendres v. Arpaio). The confiscated passport, the debt that never shrinks and the worker who cannot leave are trafficking indicators, and victims are interviewed as victims even when found committing offenses. Chapter 20A also prohibits organ trafficking for valuable consideration, regardless of the donor's consent (§20A.01).
Sexual offenses turn on consent and on age. Consent (SAPC §1.57) is a voluntary agreement and is not effective when given by a person the actor knows cannot appraise the nature of the act or resist it. Sexual contact is touching of the anus, breast or genitals with intent to arouse or gratify; penetration is any intrusion, however slight (§1.58). Sexual Assault (§21.01, 2nd Degree) is knowingly or intentionally causing penetration or sexual contact without consent, and consent is absent where the act is compelled by force, violence or coercion, where the person is unconscious, asleep or physically unable to resist or communicate unwillingness, where they lack capacity, or where they are below the age of consent. Aggravated Sexual Assault (§21.02, 1st Degree) adds serious bodily injury or an attempt to kill, placing the victim in fear of imminent death, serious bodily injury or kidnapping, using or exhibiting a deadly weapon, or administering an intoxicant to facilitate the offense. Unwanted sexual contact that does not involve penetration is defined as Sexual Battery (§21.11, Class A).
With a child younger than 14, Aggravated Sexual Assault of a Child (§21.03) applies regardless of purported consent; with a child younger than 17, Indecency with a Child (§21.06) covers sexual contact or exposure, and Statutory Rape (§21.10) covers sexual conduct with a non-spouse; in §21.03 and §21.06 mistake of age is not a defense. Sexual conduct by a peace officer or jailer with a person known to be in custody is §21.15 (3rd Degree), because custody makes consent ineffective. Recording intimate areas without consent is §21.07, hidden cameras in private spaces §21.18, disclosing intimate images §21.09, and coercing a person with threats to expose intimate material is Sextortion (§22.37).
Robbery is theft plus violence or fear. Robbery (SAPC §29.01, 2nd Degree) is committed when, in the course of committing theft and with intent to obtain or maintain control of the property, the actor intentionally, knowingly or recklessly causes bodily injury, or intentionally or knowingly threatens or places another in fear of imminent bodily injury or death. 'In the course of committing theft' includes the attempt, the commission and immediate flight, so a shoplifter who punches a loss-prevention officer in the parking lot to keep the merchandise has committed robbery, even if he never threatened anyone inside. Aggravated Robbery (§29.02, 1st Degree) adds serious bodily injury, use or exhibition of a deadly weapon, or a victim who is elderly or disabled; §29.03 applies when the weapon is a firearm. Other 1st Degree robberies target a pharmacy for controlled substances (§29.04), a bank, credit union or armored carrier (§29.05), an elderly or disabled person (§29.06), a habitation entered without effective consent (Home Invasion Robbery, §29.09), or compel an ATM withdrawal or funds transfer (Express Robbery, §29.08). Carjacking, taking a vehicle from a person's presence by force or intimidation, is §31.12 (2nd Degree), and Carjacking with a Child Present is §29.07 (1st Degree). A completed robbery does not require that the property be obtained: the attempt is within 'the course of committing theft'.
Constitution and case law
The federal authorities this module's questions rely on, and the rule the academy takes from each.
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