Romeo and Juliet laws in Alabama.
Alabama writes its close-in-age rule directly into the crime: rape in the second degree requires an actor at least two years older than a partner between twelve and sixteen. Two years - and the clock is counted in birthdays, not school years.
The Alabama baseline.
The age of consent in Alabama is sixteen. The statutory-rape statute for teenagers - rape in the second degree, Ala. Code § 13A-6-62 - covers victims twelve to fifteen, but only where the actor is sixteen or older and at least two years older than the victim. Below twelve, rape in the first degree applies to any actor sixteen or older, and the exemption world ends entirely.
How the two-year rule works.
The two-year element is jurisdictional math: a seventeen-year-old with a fifteen-year-old partner who is twenty-two months younger is outside the statute; make the gap twenty-five months and the same couple is a Class B felony - up to twenty years. Alabama courts count actual dates of birth, which makes birth certificates the first exhibits in these cases. Note what the rule is not: it is not a defense the jury weighs. If the gap is under two years, the offense simply does not exist - which is why precise age documentation ends some of these cases in a prosecutor’s office rather than a courtroom.
What the exemption never covers.
Close-in-age rules govern one thing: consensual contact between peers. They do not touch positions of trust - teachers, coaches, clergy, and employers face separate statutes regardless of age gaps. They do not legalize images: explicit photos of anyone under 18 are child pornography under federal law, even a photo of yourself, even sent willingly between two teenagers. And they do not travel: crossing state lines changes the applicable law mid-trip, and federal statutes like § 2423 attach the moment travel or the internet is involved. The exemption is a shield for Alabama conduct only - and a narrow one.
If you or your child is charged in Alabama.
These cases begin with a phone extraction and an interview - and the interview is where they are usually lost. Say nothing, consent to nothing, and get counsel moving the same week: the age documentation, the messages showing what each person represented, and the relationship timeline all get assembled before the narrative hardens. Where the close-in-age rule applies, we make prosecutors confront it early - many of these cases are declinable on the math alone.
And because registration is the real, permanent penalty here, every decision - plea, trial, diversion - gets measured first against the registry. This firm defends these cases in state and federal court, and the first consultation is free and confidential.
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