Criminal jurisdiction is a term used in constitutional law and public law to describe the power of courts to hear a case brought by a state accusing a defendant of the commission of a crime. It is relevant in three distinct situations:

1. to regulate the relationship between states, or between one state and another;
2. where the nation is a federation, to regulate the relationship between the federal courts and the domestic courts of those states comprising the federation; and
3. where a state only has, to a greater or lesser extent, a single and unified system of law, it is the law of criminal procedure to regulate what cases each classification of court within the judicial system shall adjudicate upon.