4 days Ago
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. — While you can get arrested for taking a Louisville slugger to both headlights, you can’t get arrested for cheating on your spouse anymore in New York.
That’s right: Blast all the Carrie Underwood you want, but the state’s 117-year-old law that made adultery a class-B misdemeanor punishable by up to three months in jail and a $500 fine has been slashed from state law. “While I’ve been fortunate to share a loving married life with my husband for 40 years — making it somewhat ironic for me to sign a bill decriminalizing adultery — I know that people often have complex relationships,” Gov. Kathy Hochul said in a written statement.
“These matters should clearly be handled by these individuals and not our criminal justice system. Let’s take this silly, outdated statute off the books, once and for all.” Adultery bans are still written law in many states across the nation and were enacted to make it harder to get a divorce at a time when proving a spouse cheated was the only way to get a legal separation.
Some states have also moved to repeal their adultery laws in recent years, just like New York did. Charges, though, have been rare — and convictions even rarer. New York defined adultery as when a person “engages in sexual intercourse with another person at a time when he has a living spouse, or the other person has a living spouse.
” The state’s law was first used a few weeks after it went into effect, according to a New York Times article , to arrest a married man and 25-year-old woman. State Assemblyman Charles Lavine (D-Long Island) was sponsor of the bill. Only 10 members of the 150-member Assembly voted against a version of the legislation in March, and only four members of the 63-member Senate voted against their own version, sponsored by State Sen.
Liz Krueger (D-Manhattan), on April 4. All of Staten Island’s legislators voted in favor of the bills. -- Associated Press material was used in this report.
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