Crime ( Oblivion ) A crime is an unlawful act which a guard can reprimand the Hero for committing . Upon being caught for a crime , one will be given the option to pay the bounty , go to prison , or resist arrest . To be able to distinguish if entering a door or taking an item is a crime , hover the cursor over the object . If it becomes a red hand , it is considered unlawful to enter the door or touch the item . List of crimes . From least to most serious with their bounty value . Understanding crimes and bounties . The game differentiates between committing a crime and receiving a bounty . For example , attacking any NPC unprovoked is considered an assault by the game ; however , not all assaults will result in a bounty . There must be a guard nearby to witness the crime before the Hero will be charged with committing it . Technically speaking , there is a hidden setting on all NPCs called Responsibility that affects their criminal behavior . NPCs with lower values are more likely to commit crimes ( for example , all fences have a low Responsibility ) . Any NPC with the maximum Responsibility of 100 , which primarily includes the city guards and the named guard NPCs , can add a bounty to the Hero . Guards within about 140 feet of a witness will respond to an alarm . A guard can either see a crime first - hand , or they can be notified about it from other witnesses nearby . Such witnesses will yell out an alarm , such as " There ' s a madman on the loose ! " ( assault ) , or " Stop ! Thief ! " ( pickpocket ) , when they want to report crime to the guards . Not all NPCs will raise an alarm . For example , most of the companion characters that can be obtained after completing side quests will rarely raise an alarm against the Hero . If one commits a crime out of both sight and hearing range of any guards , or if there is no alarm raised , the Hero will not receive a bounty . The only way to detect that a crime has been committed is by looking at one ' s journal . Guards . Any guard who witnesses a crime in progress can place a bounty upon the Hero . Guards can also hear alarms raised by other NPCs . Once a guard hears such an alarm , it behaves exactly as if he had seen the crime himself . Once a guard detects the crime , it is " reported " to the authorities across all of Cyrodiil instantly . Even if the guard witnesses all die ( such as during a large - scale battle ) , the crime has already been reported across the province . If the Hero has a bounty , any guard they will encounter will know of it . If a hostile guard is chasing the Hero , any other guards encountered will become hostile as well . Outrunning all pursuers will no longer trigger an automatic arrest around new guards . However , if any guards are spoken to , they will be aware of the crime and ask for the bounty to be paid . It should be noted that any witnesses of a crime may lower their disposition towards the Hero , even if one is not caught by a guard . Generally speaking , if one commits a crime against someone whom the witnesses have a high disposition towards , their disposition towards the Hero will lower . The victim may be either the target of the crime , or the owner of the objects or room that were the target of the crime . A victim ' s disposition will lower by twice as much as any other witness . Theft and pickpocketing . Both theft and pickpocketing involve taking items that do not belong to the Hero . Theft occurs when the Hero takes an object from the world , or from a container , and is punished based on the value of the item . Pickpocketing involves taking items from an NPCs inventory , and is punishable at a fixed amount . Even attempting to pickpocket someone is a crime , if they detect the Hero . In both cases , if one is sneaking when trying to take the item ( which is always the case with pickpocketing ) , the weight and size of the object determines how likely it is to be detected . As a special case , pickpocketed gold , even though it weighs nothing , is very likely to result in being detected when taken . Each item taken is another occurrence of a crime ; for pickpocketing , each item taken causes another chance to be detected by the victim . Stolen items are permanently marked as such in one ' s inventory , and most merchants will not buy them . Only merchants with a very low responsibility level will even consider buying stolen goods . Primarily , this means fence s for the Thieves Guild , but a few other merchants , including the Dunbarrow Cove pirates , will also deal with them . Only selling to sanctioned guild fences counts towards one ' s fenced items total for the Thieves Guild quests . Note that picking open a locked chest or container , by itself , is not a crime . An object will need to be removed from the container to count as a theft . It should also be noted that , if a guard ' s disposition is over 91 , they will not arrest the Hero for pickpocketing / theft . Assault and murder . Not all attacks constitute an assault . If the NPC becomes hostile towards the Hero and attempts to attack them , there is no crime in attacking them in response . It is not a crime to attack a non - NPC creature ( except owned farm animals ) , and certain NPC characters are considered " evil " enough that it is not a crime to attack them , regardless of their actions against the Hero . Otherwise , any attack on an NPC is a crime . By definition , this includes any attempt to sneak attack someone . Attacking allied NPCs accidentally is also an assault ; however , they will not report the Hero to a guard immediately . If one attacks an ally in direct sight of a guard , this will result in a bounty . In some cases , particularly when the guards are following the Hero for a quest , they will ignore the first occurrence of a crime , even if they witness it . Allies will give three warnings to the Hero if they hit them , before turning hostile and calling for guards . If any non - hostile NPC is killed , it is considered murder . Again , this includes potentially hostile NPCs , if they are managed to have been killed before they become hostile . As an example , killing Mythic Dawn sleeper agents who have not yet become hostile is murder . This can cause problems during battles with multiple allies and guards present . If an ally is accidentally killed with a single attack and a guard is present , all guards immediately become hostile . Even if all witnessing guards are killed , any other guard detects the Hero will attempt an arrest . Unlike assaults , there is never any leeway granted for accidentally murdering an ally . Lastly , one ' s first murder , detected or not , will always be detected by the Dark Brotherhood , and will trigger a visit the next time the Hero sleeps . There is a glitch in the game that makes murder counter - intuitive . To commit murder , one must be directly responsible dealing the last point of health damage . For example , a spell cast from the Hero that does damage over time will result in murder if the NPC is killed from it . However , if one poisons or enchants a weapon with a " damage over time " effect , and the poison or enchantment kills the NPC gradually , then the game will attribute the NPC ' s death to the poison or enchantment , rather than the person who stuck the NPC , and will only result in a 40 assault bounty . The same thing applies if one feeds an NPC a Poisoned Apple or pushes them off of a cliff or into a pit of lava . However , this glitch has some downsides . If one ' s ally is in battle and is killed by friendly fire from the Hero , the Hero will be guilty of murder . If a summoned creature kills or assaults an NPC , the Hero will still be guilty of the crime , even though they were not directly responsible for it . Trespassing . If a guard sees the Hero trespassing , they will immediately receive the trespass bounty . Other NPCs , however , will usually be more lenient . Trespassing around " off - duty " guards may also not immediately trigger a bounty , although this is a rare occurrence . Non - guard NPCs will warn the Hero a number of times to leave the area before alarming the guards , and will follow them until they leave . If one continues to trespass in their line of sight , the NPC will become increasingly hostile . After a short period of time , the NPC will determine that the Hero is intentionally trespassing , and will become hostile . They will call for guards and will begin to attack . If no guards are nearby , the Hero can flee the area without receiving a bounty . Even if the victim follows and attacks the Hero in a public area , one will still not receive a bounty . It should be noted that picking open a locked door , by itself , is not a crime . However , in most cases , locked doors lead to owned rooms , and entering such a room is trespassing . A crime will be committed as soon as one enters through the door after unlocking it . A guard which sees the Hero go through the door will attempt an arrest . However , it is possible for a door to be locked , but the room beyond be public ( the door icon is not red ) ; it is also possible for an unlocked door to still lead to an area that is off limits . In such cases , the room , not the door lock , determines if the law is being broken . Guards . Whenever one resists arrest or avoids to pay the penalty for crime , guards around Cyrodiil will confront or attack the Hero . fast traveling to another city will not stop this from occurring . Dealing with the bounty . Paying the bounty . Paying the bounty will remove the amount of gold asked for , as well as all stolen items that are non - quest related . Jail . While in jail , the Hero will be able to hide one lockpick . All previous attire will be replaced by a shirt , pants , and shoes . If the Hero successfully escapes from prison , they will have to sneak past or kill the guards in the jail and city , as well as retrieve their items from the Evidence Chest in the prison . Note that the locks on the cell door are always " hard " or " very hard , " meaning that , if one has an Open Hard Lock spell , the door can be unlocked without using the lockpick . Otherwise , the Hero can sleep in the bed in their cell and serve their time in jail . Every 100 in the bounty equates to one day in prison . For each day spent in prison , one of the Hero ' s skills will degrade . The skills that are affected are chosen randomly ; one could lose a single point from several skills , several points from a single skill , or a combination of the two . There is also a chance that Sneak or Security skills may be chosen , and will raise instead . You cannot lose or gain more than 10 skill points in a single jail sentence . There are numerous companion bugs which may bring NPCs that were once part of one ' s party to the jail entrance ; the first the Hero is likely to encounter are the Cheydinhal Fighters Guild NPCs from quest " The Desolate Mine . " Resisting arrest . Upon choosing to resist arrest , the guard being spoken to , as well as any other guards in the vicinity , will attack immediately . The Hero may either kill all of the guards in the vicinity , yield to one of them ( this is usually only possible with the local captain ) , or run and find a Doyen in the Thieves Guild to pay off the bounty . This can be difficult , as fast traveling is disabled while being pursued by guards . If the Hero is a member of a guild , another method is to head to that faction ' s guildhouse , which will allow the other members to attack the guards . Afterwords , the guards will not attack the Hero , but will attempt to make the Hero pay the fine once spoken to . If the Hero engages any guard in conversation , they will once again give the options of paying the fine , going to jail , or resisting arrest . Another method , if the Hero is a member of the Arcane University and has a bounty of less than 1000 , is to create a charming spell , then use it on a guard . Immediately after casting it , talk to the guard . He will tell the Hero that , because they are friends , he will take care of the bounty . However , this is also possible if the Hero has a very high Fame rating ( 80 – 100 ) . Thieves Guild . If the Hero is a member of the Thieves Guild , they can pay half of the bounty to a Thieves Guild Doyen and clear the fine . This is the only way for the Hero to keep any stolen items without having to resist arrest or ignore the guards . NPCs and crimes . NPCs follow most of the same rules to crimes , but with one notable exception : they cannot be jailed unless a specific script tells the guard to take them to jail ( i . e . Llathasa ' s Bust in the Thieves Guild quest " The Elven Maiden " ) . They must either pay their fine or resist arrest . Like the Hero , an NPC can only pay their fine if they have the necessary gold in their inventory . If they cannot pay the fine , they must resist arrest , which usually results in their death . The Hero can choose to give the NPC the necessary gold by bribing them in the persuasion minigame . However , there is a scripting glitch that may prevent an NPC ' s bounty from being reset to zero automatically . At this point , the only way to keep the NPC alive is to either clear their bounty manually using console commands , or continue bribing them with a supply of gold .