New York Romeo and Juliet Laws

Thanks for visiting Spodek Law Group – managed by Todd Spodek, a second-generation law firm with over 40 years of combined experience defending clients across New York. When people search for “Romeo and Juliet laws,” they’re looking for legal protection for consensual relationships between teenagers or young adults close in age. Here’s what New York actually provides: almost nothing. New York has no Romeo and Juliet law – no blanket exception protecting close-in-age couples from prosecution. Instead, the state offers a narrow affirmative defense for one specific offense (rape in the second degree), leaving everyone else exposed to felony charges, sex offender registration, and lifetime consequences for what might be a consensual high school relationship.

This creates absurd and constitutionally troubling outcomes. Two sixteen-year-olds who engage in consensual sexual activity can both be prosecuted for statutory rape. An eighteen-year-old high school senior dating a sixteen-year-old junior faces up to four years in prison if prosecutors decide to charge rape in the third degree. A twenty-year-old college student with a seventeen-year-old partner sits one year away from legality – but prosecutors can destroy their life anyway because New York’s age of consent is seventeen, not sixteen.

What the Law Actually Says

Age of consent: seventeen. Anyone younger cannot legally consent – period. New York Penal Law Article 130 criminalizes sexual conduct based on age differences. Rape third degree: defendant 21+ with person under 17 (Class E felony, up to four years). Rape second degree: defendant 18+ with person under 15, minimum four-year gap (Class D felony, up to seven years) – but here’s the catch, you get an affirmative defense if you’re less than four years older. Rape first degree: victim under 11, or under 13 with defendant 18+ (Class B felony, up to twenty-five years). Notice what’s missing? Protection for the twenty-one-year-old dating a sixteen-year-old. Protection for the eighteen-year-old high school senior with a sixteen-year-old sophomore. The four-year affirmative defense applies only to rape second degree – everyone else facing statutory rape charges in New York has no close-in-age exception whatsoever. Prosecutors can charge sexual misconduct (Class A misdemeanor, up to 364 days) for consensual activity when parties are close in age, but they’re not required to. It’s discretionary. Whether you face a misdemeanor or a felony depends entirely on the district attorney’s mood, office policy, parental pressure.

This Isn’t a Romeo and Juliet Law

Texas provides an affirmative defense if participants are within three years of age, both at least fourteen, conduct consensual. Florida allows removal from sex offender registration if you meet close-in-age criteria. These states recognize that an eighteen-year-old dating a sixteen-year-old isn’t the same moral category as an adult predator targeting children. New York refuses to make that distinction in most cases. One narrow affirmative defense for rape second degree doesn’t constitute Romeo and Juliet protection – it leaves most young defendants exposed. Twenty-one-year-old dating a sixteen-year-old? Rape third, no defense. Eighteen-year-old high school senior with sixteen-year-old sophomore? Prosecutors choose rape third (aggressive) or sexual misconduct (lenient) based entirely on discretion. Two sixteen-year-olds engaging in consensual sex? Both technically guilty of statutory rape, though prosecution is rare. At Spodek Law Group – we’ve defended clients in statutory rape cases where the age gap was minimal, the relationship consensual, the conduct exactly what thousands of teenagers do every weekend across New York. But prosecutors charged felonies anyway because New York law allows it, because there’s no Romeo and Juliet protection requiring them to treat close-in-age cases differently.

2024 Made Things Worse

In 2024, Governor Hochul signed the “Rape is Rape Bill,” broadening New York’s rape definition to include oral and anal contact. Previously those acts constituted criminal sexual act charges under separate statutes. Now it’s all rape – first, second, or third degree depending on ages. Sounds like progressive reform: recognizing all non-consensual sexual contact as rape. But it also criminalized more conduct between teenagers and young adults. Before 2024, an eighteen-year-old who engaged in oral sex with a sixteen-year-old faced criminal sexual act charges. After 2024, that same conduct is rape third degree if the defendant is over twenty-one. The label matters – rape carries greater stigma, harsher sentences, more restrictive sex offender registration. When you expand what qualifies as “rape” without expanding close-in-age protections, you increase prosecutions of young people engaging in consensual activity. Even when New York’s narrow affirmative defense applies (rape second, under four-year gap), it doesn’t prevent prosecution. You still get arrested, arraigned, charged with a Class D felony, required to post bail or sit in Rikers, name in public records, face in local news. You go to trial, prosecution presents evidence, then – only then – you raise the affirmative defense that you were less than four years older. States with true Romeo and Juliet laws prevent charges from being filed. New York makes you fight after the damage is done.

The Constitutional Problem

New York’s refusal to implement meaningful Romeo and Juliet protections creates equal protection concerns. Why does the eighteen-year-old dating a fourteen-year-old get an affirmative defense while the twenty-one-year-old dating a sixteen-year-old faces four years in prison with no defense available? Both involve a three-year age gap. Both involve someone under the age of consent. The only difference is arbitrary statutory line-drawing that treats similar conduct dramatically differently based on which specific charge prosecutors select.

Due process requires fair notice of what conduct is criminal. When New York criminalizes consensual sexual activity between a seventeen-year-old and a sixteen-year-old in some circumstances but not others, depending entirely on prosecutorial discretion to charge felony rape versus misdemeanor sexual misconduct – that’s not fair notice. That’s arbitrary enforcement. Young people can’t predict whether their consensual relationship will result in misdemeanor charges, felony charges, or no charges at all.

At Spodek Law Group, we challenge prosecutorial decisions that treat consensual relationships between young people as predatory crimes. Todd Spodek’s representation of Anna Delvey showed what vigorous advocacy looks like when prosecutors overcharge based on political pressure and media attention rather than proportionate justice. Statutory rape cases involving close-in-age defendants present similar dynamics – prosecutors charge aggressively because parents demand it, because headlines generate political capital, because New York law allows them to destroy young lives without legal constraint. Your defense requires forcing prosecutors to justify why this relationship warrants felony prosecution, why this conduct merits sex offender registration, why this defendant poses a threat to public safety.

Rape convictions require sex offender registration – public listing on New York’s registry, address restrictions, employment limitations, housing denials, for the rest of your life. Even sexual misconduct convictions can trigger registration depending on circumstances. You’re not just facing jail time – you’re facing permanent social and economic exclusion. In states with close-in-age exceptions, consensual teenage relationships don’t result in lifetime registration. In New York, they can. Prosecutors will tell you the law provides flexibility through charging discretion, that they evaluate each case individually, consider relationship dynamics, avoid prosecution when conduct is truly consensual. But discretion without legal standards is arbitrary power. Constitutional protections don’t trust prosecutors to be reasonable – they establish rules limiting prosecutorial authority. New York refuses to establish those rules, leaving young defendants entirely at the mercy of whichever assistant district attorney handles their file. If you’re charged with statutory rape, sexual abuse, or sexual misconduct based on your partner’s age – you need defense counsel who understands these cases aren’t always about predation. Sometimes they’re about prosecutors with too much discretion. We’re available 24/7. Call us.