First, some legal systems distinguish between ‘crimes’ properly speaking and other kinds of penalised conduct. So German law distinguishes ‘Strafrecht’ and ‘Straftaten’ (criminal law and crimes) from ‘Ordnungswidrigkeitenrecht’ and ‘Ordnungswidrigkeiten’ (regulations and violations; Weigend 1988); and the American Law Institute's Model Penal Code distinguishes ‘crimes’ from ‘violations’ (s. 1.04). Violations might include conduct that other legal systems count as criminal, although even in systems in which it counts formally as criminal, it is often seen as not ‘really’ criminal (thus German Ordnungswidrigkeitenrecht includes many traffic violations that English law defines as crimes, although many drivers would deny that they are ‘real’ crimes).
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/criminal-law/

In addition to the criminal law, German law contains another system— the so-called “Ordnungswidrigkeitenrecht”—that imposes fines for minor wrongdoing. If prohibited conduct is only an “Ordnungswidrigkeit” (a violation), incarceration is not possible, not even as a “back-up” sanction. In other legal systems, the legislature’s decisionmaking should follow similar lines. One has to ask whether minor interferences with the interests of others can be prevented by civil law or administrative measures, and, if criminal sanctions are seen as necessary, for what conduct the proportionate punishment can be only a fine.67

Under German Law, a violation (Ordnungswidrigkeit) would fit the degree of wrongdoing.

http://wings.buffalo.edu/law/bclc/bclrarticles/5(1)/Hornle.p...


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Note added at 7 hrs (2009-05-21 18:01:16 GMT)
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The best translation for Ordnungswidrigkeit is regulatory offence, I'd say. That's what Margaret Marks (former professor of legal translation) uses.

http://transblawg.eu/index.php?/archives/1836-Crossing-again...