5 Answers

Perjury, or lying under oath, is often charged as a felony. In the United States, perjury at the federal level and, in most state courts, is a felony punishable by a year or more in prison. As another example, in the United Kingdom, perjury is punishable by up to seven years in prison.

Yes, perjury is lying!

The most common penalty for perjury is a fine and/or jail, but the amount of the fine or jail time can depend on judicial discretion in sentencing. It’s possible for there to be a minimum sentence length as a penalty for perjury, perhaps one year, and a maximum length of sentencing at five to 10 years per charge. If the person has committed more than one act of perjury, as by making numerous false statements under oath, he or she could be charged with multiple offenses and that could increase total fines charged or jail time. If the penalty for perjury is a mandatory one-year sentence, and the person perjured himself five times, he might face five years in prison.

Sometimes a judge has the discretion to decide against handing down a sentence as a penalty for perjury. There are people who have been convicted of the crime, and yet haven’t faced any type of jail time.

British novelist and former politician Jeffrey Archer committed perjury and served a prison sentence. He wrote a book 'The Prison Diaries', well worth reading.

Ask for an attorney. If you are not charged with a crime the 10th Amendment allows you not to answer a question that may incriminate you and if you are unsure, you have a right to an attorney in council.