statutory rape
noun1
Law An illegal act of sexual intercourse by an adult with a person under the legal age of consent for sex, or with another adult who is not able to consent because of intellectual disability.
- Historically, statutory rape laws were enacted to protect the chastity and morality of young women. These statutes made it a crime for a man to have sexual intercourse with a young woman under a certain age (usually eighteen), even if the young woman consented to the act. (Today of, course, statuory rape provisions protect minors of both genders.)1999, Raneta Lawson Mack, A Layperson's Guide to Criminal Law, Greenwood Publishing Group, →ISBN, page 72: