Home > Age of consent
3.4 O-T
3.5 United Kingdom
- United Kingdom: (see [1] and [2], a 2003 overhaul of hundred-year-old laws on sexual activity which came into force in 2003)
- 18 years for any sexual act if there is a relationship of trust (e.g. teacher/pupil) (unless they are a married couple, in which case the below applies)
- Great Britain: heterosexual and male homosexual 16
- Northern Ireland: heterosexual and male homosexual 17
- Note: while there is not specific law for lesbians, sex with a girl under 16 years old could be prosecuted under child abuse legislation.
- Jersey: 16 (18 homosexual)
(Before 2001 the homosexual age of consent in England and Wales was 18, and before the early 1990s it was 21, the age it was set at when consensual buggery was decriminalised)
3.6 United States of America
- United States: varies from state to state, usually between 16 and 18; some states formerly forbade homosexual acts entirely, however such laws have been declared unconstitutional in 2003 ( Lawrence v. Texas). Federal law forbids crossing state lines or international borders with the intent of having commercial sex with a person who is under 18, or any sex with a person who is under 16 and at least 4 years younger than the perpetrator (18 U.S.C. 2243, 18 U.S.C. 2423). In the US it is illegal to produce pornography featuring those under 18 and prosecutions have been commenced for cases where both partners are over the age of consent and under 18 years old, where they were making material solely for their own consumption or that of their lawful partner. The constitutionality of these cases is uncertain.
