Attorney's Note

Under the N.C. Gen. Statutes, punishments for crimes depend on the classification. In the case of this section:
ClassPrisonFine
Class I felonybetween 3 and 12 months
For details, see § 15A-1340.17

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Terms Used In North Carolina General Statutes 14-120

  • Counterfeit: means to manufacture, copy, reproduce, or forge an instrument that purports to be genuine, but is not, because it has been falsely copied, reproduced, forged, manufactured, embossed, encoded, duplicated, or altered. See North Carolina General Statutes 14-119
  • Instrument: means (i) any currency, bill, note, warrant, check, order, or similar instrument of or on any financial institution or governmental unit, or any cashier or officer of the institution or unit; or (ii) any security issued by, or on behalf of, any corporation, financial institution, or governmental unit. See North Carolina General Statutes 14-119

If any person, directly or indirectly, whether for the sake of gain or with intent to defraud or injure any other person, shall utter or publish any such false, forged or counterfeited instrument as is mentioned in N.C. Gen. Stat. § 14-119, or shall pass or deliver, or attempt to pass or deliver, any of them to another person (knowing the same to be falsely forged or counterfeited) the person so offending shall be punished as a Class I felon.  If any person, directly or indirectly, whether for the sake of gain or with intent to defraud or injure any other person, shall falsely make, forge or counterfeit any endorsement on any instrument described in the preceding section, whether such instrument be genuine or false, or shall knowingly utter or publish any such instrument containing a false, forged or counterfeited endorsement or, knowing the same to be falsely endorsed, shall pass or deliver or attempt to pass or deliver any such instrument containing a forged endorsement to another person, the person so offending shall be guilty of a Class I felony. (1819, c. 994, s. 2, P.R.; R.C., c. 34, s. 61; Code, s. 1031; Rev., s. 3427; 1909, c. 666; C.S., s. 4294; 1961, c. 94; 1979, c. 760, s. 5; 1979, 2nd Sess., c. 1316, s. 47; 1981, c. 63, s. 1, c. 179, s. 14; 1983, c. 397, s. 2; 1993, c. 539, s. 1185; 1994, Ex. Sess., c. 24, s. 14(c).)