Prohibited Sexual Behavior and Sexual Violence

Adult Sexual Contact with Children: Incest: Legal Aspects

Most people are probably content with the definition of incest as “sexual intercourse between close relatives” However, for the criminal law this is too vague. What exactly is meant by “sexual intercourse”? Does it mean only coitus or also manual, oral, anal, and even visual intercourse? And what are “close relatives”? Does this mean only the closest blood relatives like parent and child or brother and sister, or does it also include half-brothers, half-sisters, cousins and half-cousins? Does it include step-parents and step-children? Can incest also occur between relatives of the same sex?
Different legislatures have found different answers to these questions and have also specified different punishments. Indeed, in some countries incest as such is not a crime at all as long as the individuals involved are of the same generation, for example, two minors or two adults (1). Incest between adults and their children is often prosecuted under different statutes. In view of all this, the present course cannot go into details. Instead, we will restrict ourselves to some general observations about the incest between adults and their children.

(1) France, Belgium, Luxemburg, the Netherlands, Portugal, Japan, Turkey, and many Latin-American countries.