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Ark. Code Ann. § 5-54-120

Failure to appear

Applied in 16 court decisions — leading case Stewart v. State (2005)

Most recently applied in Robert Dale Lane v. State of Arkansas (October 2025)

Acts 1975, No. 280, § 2820; A.S.A. 1947, § 41-2820; Acts 1991, No. 916, § 1; 2011, No. 514, § 1; 2011, No. 570, § 32; 2013, No. 1193, § 1; 2015, No. 538, § 1; 2015, No. 1155, § …

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Court decisions citing this, by year. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.

(1) As used in this section, “pending charge” means a charge that results from an arrest or issuance of a citation or criminal summons, or after the filing of a criminal information or indictment and that has not been resolved by acquittal, conviction, dismissal, or nolle prosequi.

(2) A person commits the offense of failure to appear if he or she fails to appear without reasonable excuse subsequent to having been: Cited or summonsed as an accused; or

(3) Lawfully set at liberty upon condition that he or she appear at a specified time, place, and court.

(4) Failure to appear is a: Class C felony if the required appearance was in regard to a pending charge or disposition of a felony charge either before or after a determination of guilt of the felony charge;

(5) Class D felony if the required appearance was in regard to an order to appear issued before a revocation hearing under § 16-93-307 and the defendant was placed on probation or received a suspended sentence for a felony offense;

(6) Class A misdemeanor if the required appearance was in regard to a pending charge or disposition of a Class A misdemeanor charge either before or after a determination of guilt of the Class A misdemeanor charge;

(7) Class B misdemeanor if the required appearance was in regard to a pending charge or disposition of a Class B misdemeanor charge either before or after a determination of guilt of the Class B misdemeanor charge;

(8) Class B misdemeanor if the required appearance was in regard to a pending charge or disposition of a Class C misdemeanor charge either before or after a determination of guilt of the Class C misdemeanor charge;

(9) Unclassified misdemeanor with the same penalty as the unclassified misdemeanor in the pending charge or disposition if the required appearance was in regard to a pending charge or disposition of an unclassified misdemeanor either before or after a determination of guilt on the unclassified misdemeanor charge; and

(10) Class C misdemeanor if the required appearance was in regard to a pending charge or disposition of a violation either before or after a determination of guilt of the violation charge.

(11) This section does not apply to an order to appear imposed as a condition of suspension or probation under § 5-4-303.

Current official text: Arkansas General Assembly. Digitized from the UniCourt Code Improvement Commission public-domain capture. Reproduced from public-domain Arkansas statutes; confirm against the official source for the current text. Not legal advice.