Eli5 What does “aggravated” mean when added to a criminal charge?

Question

What is the difference between assault and aggravated assault? Identity theft and aggravated identity theft?

In: 111

Answer 1

In general, it means “you did something to make it worse”.

So there’s assault and *aggravated assault.* The latter essentially means you did something to make it substantially worse than run-of-the-mill assault, like your attack was exceptionally violent or cruel.