Crimes of Moral Turpitude

Fornication or Mann Act violations (where compulsion was not inherent in the crime) are NOT considered crimes of moral turpitude.[199]  Some such convictions may also be subject to challenge on constitutional grounds.[200]

Matter of Farinas, 12 I. & N. Dec. 467 (BIA 1967) (abduction for purpose of marriage);

In re Van Dessel, 243 F.Supp. 328, 330-331 (D.Pa. 1965) (offense of fornication under 18 Penn.Stats. § 4506 not considered crime of moral turpitude: “Moreover, there appears to be no authority to support the proposition that fornication is a crime involving moral turpitude.”), citing Ex parte Isojoki, 222 Fed. 151 (N.D.Cal. 1915);

Matter of R, 6 I. & N. Dec. 444 (BIA 1954) (conviction on July 30, 1942, for violation of the Mann Act (18 U.S.C. § 398, now § 2421) based upon an indictment charging that respondent transported a female with intent to “induce, entice and compel” her to engage “in illicit sexual intercourse with him” is not one for a crime involving moral turpitude);

Matter of D, 1 I. & N. Dec. 186 (BIA 1941).

Matter of Rocha, 30 F.2d 823 (D. Tex. 1929) (neither occasional illicit intercourse nor adultery was a crime at common law, and under the statutes of Texas, adultery, to be punishable, must be committed by acts of intimacy, “while living together,” or habitually);

Ex parte Isojoki, 222 Fed. 151 (D.Cal. 1915) (fornication of an unmarried woman who had lived in Sweden with an unmarried man and who had committed isolated acts of sexual intercourse with other unmarried men, both in Sweden and on a ship en route to Australia, held not CMT);

United States ex rel. Huber v Sibray, 178 F. 144 (C.C.Pa. 1910), rev’d on other grounds, 185 F. 401 (3d Cir. 1910) (Austrian conviction of sexual intercourse of a married man with an unmarried woman was not an offense involving moral turpitude, since the act was not a felony or crime under the law; court doubted whether fornication was even a misdemeanor at common law, since the offense, if any, was little more than a private wrong);

[199] 9 U.S. Dep’t of State, Foreign Affairs Manual (FAM) § 40.21(a) N.2.3-3(b)(4) (fornication), N. 2.3-3(b)(9) (“Mann Act violations (where coercion is not present)”).

[200] Lawrence v. Texas, 123 S.Ct. 2472 (June 26, 2003) (Texas conviction of “deviate sexual conduct” (oral or anal sex or penetration with an object) between members of the same sex, in violation of Texas Code Ann. § 21.06(a), held in violation of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, where both partners were adults at the time of the offense which was consensual and occurred in private).