{"id":1082,"date":"2026-04-29T10:40:56","date_gmt":"2026-04-29T14:40:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/?p=1082"},"modified":"2026-04-30T23:30:19","modified_gmt":"2026-05-01T03:30:19","slug":"when-is-reckless-driving-a-felony-or-misdemeanor-in-ga","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/when-is-reckless-driving-a-felony-or-misdemeanor-in-ga\/","title":{"rendered":"Reckless Driving GA &#8211; Felony or Misdemeanor in 2026?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By Atlanta Criminal Defense Lawyer Larry Kohn, a 28-year veteran defender in courtrooms all over GA, and a Super Lawyer 9 years in a row<\/p>\n<p><strong><em>Reckless driving in Georgia can be either a serious misdemeanor, or even charged as a felony.<\/em><\/strong> Reckless driving is one of the few &#8220;serious&#8221; misdemeanor offenses in the state criminal code. But any of these &#8220;serious&#8221; driving crimes can be the basis for a prosecutor adding very serious felony charges, when another person is injured by your reckless driving (passenger, another driver, or a pedestrian).<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-1253 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/Smyrna-1.png\" alt=\"Atlanta DUI lawyer Cory Yager and his law partner Larry Kohn have handled many drunk driving reduced to reckless driving misdemeanor cases over two decades. An arrest is not a conviction!\" width=\"940\" height=\"248\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/Smyrna-1.png 940w, https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/Smyrna-1-300x79.png 300w, https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/Smyrna-1-768x203.png 768w, https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/Smyrna-1-455x120.png 455w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 940px) 100vw, 940px\" \/><\/p>\n<h2><strong>How Reckless Driving and a Georgia DUI Are Similar<\/strong><\/h2>\n<div class=\"read_more_link\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/when-is-reckless-driving-a-felony-or-misdemeanor-in-ga\/\"  title=\"Continue Reading Reckless Driving GA &#8211; Felony or Misdemeanor in 2026?\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading \u203a<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Atlanta Criminal Defense Lawyer Larry Kohn, a 28-year veteran defender in courtrooms all over GA, and a Super Lawyer 9 years in a row Reckless driving in Georgia can be either a serious misdemeanor, or even charged as a felony. Reckless driving is one of the few &#8220;serious&#8221; misdemeanor offenses in the state criminal [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1082","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dui-defense","category-reckless-driving"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Reckless Driving GA - Felony or Misdemeanor in 2026?<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Charged with reckless driving in Georgia in 2026? It&#039;s usually a misdemeanor vs a felony but in cases of injuries or even death the charge changes to a felony. Free consultation and payment plans.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/when-is-reckless-driving-a-felony-or-misdemeanor-in-ga\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"Reckless Driving GA - Felony or Misdemeanor in 2026?\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"Charged with reckless driving in Georgia in 2026? It&#039;s usually a misdemeanor vs a felony but in cases of injuries or even death the charge changes to a felony. Free consultation and payment plans.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/Smyrna-1.png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Kohn &amp; Yager LLC\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"9 minutes\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Reckless Driving GA - Felony or Misdemeanor in 2026?","description":"Charged with reckless driving in Georgia in 2026? It's usually a misdemeanor vs a felony but in cases of injuries or even death the charge changes to a felony. Free consultation and payment plans.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/when-is-reckless-driving-a-felony-or-misdemeanor-in-ga\/","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_title":"Reckless Driving GA - Felony or Misdemeanor in 2026?","twitter_description":"Charged with reckless driving in Georgia in 2026? It's usually a misdemeanor vs a felony but in cases of injuries or even death the charge changes to a felony. Free consultation and payment plans.","twitter_image":"https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/Smyrna-1.png","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Kohn &amp; Yager LLC","Est. reading time":"9 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/when-is-reckless-driving-a-felony-or-misdemeanor-in-ga\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/when-is-reckless-driving-a-felony-or-misdemeanor-in-ga\/"},"author":{"name":"Kohn &amp; Yager LLC","@id":"https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/55598014d693ea002cf70d85364edd9f"},"headline":"Reckless Driving GA &#8211; Felony or Misdemeanor in 2026?","datePublished":"2026-04-29T14:40:56+00:00","dateModified":"2026-05-01T03:30:19+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/when-is-reckless-driving-a-felony-or-misdemeanor-in-ga\/"},"wordCount":1827,"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/when-is-reckless-driving-a-felony-or-misdemeanor-in-ga\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/Smyrna-1.png","articleSection":["DUI Defense","Reckless Driving"],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/when-is-reckless-driving-a-felony-or-misdemeanor-in-ga\/","url":"https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/when-is-reckless-driving-a-felony-or-misdemeanor-in-ga\/","name":"Reckless Driving GA - Felony or Misdemeanor in 2026?","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/when-is-reckless-driving-a-felony-or-misdemeanor-in-ga\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/when-is-reckless-driving-a-felony-or-misdemeanor-in-ga\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/Smyrna-1.png","datePublished":"2026-04-29T14:40:56+00:00","dateModified":"2026-05-01T03:30:19+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.georgiacriminaldefense.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/55598014d693ea002cf70d85364edd9f"},"description":"Charged with reckless driving in Georgia in 2026? It's usually a misdemeanor vs a felony but in cases of injuries or even death the charge changes to a felony. 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