New Jersey Pepper Spray and Stun Gun Laws (2026)

New Jersey treats pepper spray and stun guns very differently on the statute's own text. The weapons-prohibition chapter of the Code of Criminal Justice carves out a detailed, numeric self-defense exemption for one pocket-sized chemical spray device, and separately makes stun-gun possession a fourth-degree crime with no such exemption written into the code. That stun-gun statute, N.J.S.2C:39-3(h), has never been repealed or amended, but the Attorney General has directed prosecutors and police that it, and a related statute barring the sale or shipment of stun guns, may no longer be enforced against an adult, following a 2017 federal consent order. Both provisions may still be enforced against anyone under 18: a rule adopted in 2018 bars possessing a stun gun before age 18 and bars selling or transferring one to a minor.

Jurisdiction scope: This page covers New Jersey state law only, principally N.J.S.2C:39-1, 2C:39-3, 2C:39-5, 2C:39-6, 2C:39-7, and 2C:1-5.

Is pepper spray legal to carry in New Jersey?

Legal for an adult with a clean record, within a specific capacity limit. N.J.S.A. 2C:39-6(i)(1) reads: "Nothing in N.J.S.2C:39-5 shall be construed to prevent any person who is 18 years of age or older and who has not been convicted of a crime, from possession for the purpose of personal self-defense of one pocket-sized device which contains and releases not more than three-quarters of an ounce of chemical substance not ordinarily capable of lethal use or of inflicting serious bodily injury, but rather, is intended to produce temporary physical discomfort or disability through being vaporized or otherwise dispensed in the air." Three conditions must all be met: the person must be at least 18, must not have been convicted of any crime, and the single device carried must not exceed three-quarters of an ounce (0.75 oz). New Jersey's disqualifying standard is notably wider than the felon-only bar many other states use, since "has not been convicted of a crime" excludes anyone with a prior criminal conviction of any kind, not only a felony. The same section sets a penalty floor: "Any person in possession of any device in violation of this subsection shall be deemed and adjudged to be a disorderly person, and upon conviction thereof, shall be punished by a fine of not less than $100." That $100 figure is a floor, not the statute's ceiling: N.J.S.2C:43-3(c) caps a disorderly-persons fine at $1,000, and N.J.S.2C:43-8 permits up to 6 months of imprisonment for a disorderly-persons conviction. That exposure applies both to carrying an oversized device and to carrying a qualifying device while disqualified by age or record.

N.J.S.2C:39-9(d) sets a separate rule for manufacturing, transporting, shipping, selling, or disposing of a spray device, and it tracks the possession limit above rather than duplicating it: the subsection excludes from its fourth-degree crime a device that is "for the purpose of personal self-defense, is pocket-sized and contains not more than three-quarters of an ounce of chemical substance not ordinarily capable of lethal use or of inflicting serious bodily injury." Manufacturing, transporting, shipping, selling, or disposing of a larger spray device, or one intended for a purpose other than authorized military or law enforcement use, personal self-defense, or an institutional security system, is a fourth-degree crime under that same subsection.

Are stun guns legal to carry in New Jersey?

On the statute's own text, no. N.J.S.A. 2C:39-3(h) states in full: "Stun guns. Any person who knowingly has in his possession any stun gun is guilty of a crime of the fourth degree." The statute's definitions section, 2C:39-1(t), defines a stun gun as "any weapon or other device which emits an electrical charge or current intended to temporarily or permanently disable a person," a definition broad enough to reach the ordinary handheld self-defense stun devices sold in other states. Section 2C:39-6, which lists the chapter's exemptions from subsection a. through subsection n., exempts conduct that would otherwise violate N.J.S.2C:39-5, the general unlawful-possession statute; none of its provisions reach 2C:39-3, where the stun-gun ban actually sits. 2C:39-3(g) reaches subsection h. only through paragraph (g)(1)(d): a law enforcement officer the Attorney General has specifically exempted from subsection h., and an officer who has lawfully taken possession of the device as evidence. The military and on-duty-officer exceptions elsewhere in subsection g. apply only to subsections a., b., c., d., e., f., j. and k. and do not reach the stun-gun ban at all; none of subsection g.'s exceptions are available to an ordinary civilian.

That plain text is not the whole story. A federal lawsuit, New Jersey Second Amendment Society & Mark Cheeseman v. Porrino, No. 16-4906 (D.N.J.), was filed in August 2016 challenging the stun-gun ban. The Attorney General's memorandum implementing the resulting order describes this guidance as following the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Caetano v. Massachusetts, 577 U.S. 411 (2016) (per curiam), which the memo describes as invalidating on Second Amendment grounds a state law establishing an absolute prohibition on stun-gun possession. The New Jersey Legislature's own statement to a later bill, Assembly Bill A2133 (2018-2019 session), describes a Consent Order entered April 25, 2017 in the Porrino case: the order declared N.J.S.2C:39-3(h) unconstitutional "to the extent this statute outright prohibits, under criminal penalty, individuals from possessing electronic arms" and provided that it "shall not be enforced," and it separately provided that N.J.S.2C:39-9(d) "shall not be enforced to the extent this statute prohibits, under criminal penalty, the sale or shipment of Tasers or other electronic arms." The statute's text has not been amended to match: 2C:39-3(h) still reads on its face as a categorical fourth-degree crime. The order, as the Legislature describes it, addresses an outright possession ban and the sale or shipment of the devices to an adult; it does not disturb New Jersey's separate rule for a person under 18, described next.

The Attorney General's October 20, 2017 memorandum implementing the order sets that limit directly. It advised that, as of October 22, 2017, the two provisions "shall no longer be enforced" to the extent the order describes. In response to the Consent Order, the Superintendent of State Police proposed a rule, published at 49 N.J.R. 2765(a) (Aug. 21, 2017), to maintain the prohibition on stun-gun sale and possession for minors under 18, and the memorandum directs that the prohibition under 2C:39-3(h) of possession "may still be enforced against possession by minors under the age of 18," and that the prohibition under 2C:39-9(d) of sale or shipment "may still be enforced against the sale or shipment of stun guns to minors under the age of 18." That proposed rule was adopted and took effect January 2, 2018: N.J.A.C. 13:54-5.8 states that no person under 18 years of age may possess a stun gun and that a stun gun possessed by a minor is subject to confiscation by law enforcement, and N.J.A.C. 13:54-1.3 bars selling, giving, transferring, assigning, or otherwise disposing of a stun gun to a person under 18, and bars a person under 18 from receiving, purchasing, or otherwise acquiring one. The same memorandum lists other Criminal Code provisions pertaining to stun guns that remain in force regardless of age, including N.J.S.2C:39-4(d) (possessing a weapon, defined to include a stun gun, with a purpose to use it unlawfully against a person or property, a third-degree crime), N.J.S.2C:39-4.1 (possessing a stun gun with unlawful purpose, or under circumstances not manifestly appropriate for its lawful uses, while committing certain drug offenses), and N.J.S.2C:39-5(d) (possessing a stun gun under circumstances not manifestly appropriate for its lawful uses, a fourth-degree crime); the school and certain-persons provisions covered below apply as well.

Assembly Bill A2133 and bills in later sessions were introduced to regulate the purchase and sale of stun guns directly. The current text of 2C:39-3(h) and 2C:39-9(d) shows that none of them has been enacted.

Who is barred from possessing either device, and where

Because pepper spray and stun guns are both enumerated as "weapons" in N.J.S.2C:39-1(r), paragraph (4), two more sections of the same chapter reach both devices regardless of the possession rules already described.

N.J.S.2C:39-7(a), the certain-persons statute, bars anyone previously convicted of an enumerated offense, including aggravated assault, arson, burglary, escape, extortion, homicide, kidnapping, robbery, aggravated sexual assault, sexual assault, bias intimidation, carjacking, gang criminality, racketeering, terroristic threats, endangering the welfare of a child, and any crime under 2C:39-3, 2C:39-4 or 2C:39-9, and it separately bars a person convicted of an indictable drug offense under N.J.S.2C:35-2 and a person who has ever been committed for a mental disorder, unless that person holds a physician's certificate that the disorder no longer interferes with handling a firearm, from purchasing, owning, possessing, or controlling "any of the specified weapons," a phrase the section ties to the same subsection r. list. For a person with one of those prior convictions, possessing pepper spray or a stun gun is a fourth-degree crime under 2C:39-7, separate from and in addition to the possession statutes described above.

N.J.S.2C:39-5(e)(2) makes it a fourth-degree crime to knowingly possess "any weapon enumerated in paragraphs (3) and (4) of subsection r. of N.J.S.2C:39-1," which includes pepper spray and stun guns, "while in or upon any part of the buildings or grounds of any school, college, university or other educational institution" without the written authorization of the institution's governing officer. That rule applies to the pepper-spray device that Section 2C:39-6(i) otherwise permits an adult to carry, and to a stun gun, regardless of whether the device would be lawful to carry off campus.

Local ordinances and preemption

N.J.S.A. 2C:1-5(d) provides that "the local governmental units of this State may neither enact nor enforce any ordinance or other local law or regulation conflicting with, or preempted by, any provision of this code or with any policy of this State expressed by this code, whether that policy be expressed by inclusion of a provision in the code or by exclusion of that subject from the code." Because Sections 2C:39-3, 2C:39-5, 2C:39-6, and 2C:39-7 directly regulate both stun guns and pepper spray, a municipal ordinance on either device is likely to be preempted under this section if it conflicts with those provisions or with the policy the code expresses, including by what the code chose to leave out.

Federal law: what it does and does not reach

No federal statute regulates a civilian's purchase or possession of pepper spray or a stun gun. Federal law matters in three places.

Federal buildings. Under 18 U.S.C. § 930(a), whoever knowingly possesses or causes to be present "a firearm or other dangerous weapon in a Federal facility (other than a Federal court facility)" faces a fine, imprisonment of up to 1 year, or both. Subsection (e) sets up to 2 years for a federal court facility, and subsection (b) up to 5 years where the weapon is intended to be used in a crime. Section 930(g)(2) defines the term:

The term "dangerous weapon" means a weapon, device, instrument, material, or substance, animate or inanimate, that is used for, or is readily capable of, causing death or serious bodily injury, except that such term does not include a pocket knife with a blade of less than 2½ inches in length.

The definition names neither device. Whether a particular spray or stun gun is "readily capable of" causing serious bodily injury is a question of fact the statute does not answer. Subsection (d)(3) exempts "the lawful carrying of firearms or other dangerous weapons in a Federal facility incident to hunting or other lawful purposes," and subsection (h) requires notice of the ban to be posted at each public entrance. A "Federal facility" is "a building or part thereof owned or leased by the Federal Government, where Federal employees are regularly present for the purpose of performing their official duties."

Air travel. The Transportation Security Administration's screening rules, which are agency policy rather than statute, bar both devices from carry-on bags. One 4 fl. oz. (118 ml) container of mace or pepper spray is permitted in checked baggage if it has a safety mechanism to prevent accidental discharge, and sprays containing more than 2 percent by mass of tear gas (CS or CN) are prohibited in checked baggage. Tasers, stun guns and other electro-shock weapons may travel in checked baggage only if transported so the device cannot discharge accidentally. Airlines may set stricter rules.

National parks. National Park Service regulations prohibit possessing, carrying or using a "weapon" in a park area except as the regulations provide (36 CFR 2.4(b)(1)). 36 CFR 1.4 defines "weapon" to include an "irritant gas device" and any "weapon the possession of which is prohibited under the laws of the State in which the park area or portion thereof is located."

Disclaimer: This article provides general legal information about New Jersey's pepper spray and stun gun laws as of September 2026. It is not legal advice. Consult a lawyer licensed in New Jersey for advice about a specific situation.

For a state-by-state comparison, see pepper spray and stun gun laws by state. New Jersey's self-defense statutes are covered separately on the New Jersey self-defense laws page.

Statutes cited reflect their in-force version as of 2026-09-22. Last updated: 2026-09-22.