TITLE 18

CRIMES AND PUNISHMENTS

CHAPTER 15

CHILDREN AND VULNERABLE ADULTS

18-1514.  Obscene materials — Definitions. The following definitions are applicable to this act:

(1)  "Adolescent minor" means any person thirteen (13) years of age or older but less than eighteen (18) years of age.

(2)  "Minor" means any person less than eighteen (18) years of age.

(3)  "Nudity" means the showing of the human male or female genitals, pubic area or buttocks with less than a full opaque covering, or the showing of the female breast with less than a full opaque covering of any portion thereof below the top of the nipple, or the depiction of covered male genitals in a discernibly turgid state.

(4)  "Sexual conduct" means any act of masturbation, homosexuality, sexual intercourse, or physical contact with a person’s clothed or unclothed genitals, pubic area, buttocks or, if such person be a female, the breast. Breastfeeding, childbearing, medical procedures and examinations, and any other nonerotic physical contact shall not be considered sexual conduct.

(5)  "Sexual excitement" means the condition of human male or female genitals when in a state of sexual stimulation or arousal.

(6)  "Sado-masochistic abuse" means flagellation or torture by or upon a person who is nude or clad in undergarments, a mask or bizarre costume, or the condition of being fettered, bound or otherwise physically restrained on the part of one who is nude or so clothed.

(7)(a)  "Harmful to minors" means the quality of any material when it:

(i)   Taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest of adolescent minors as judged by the average person, applying contemporary community standards; and

(ii)  Depicts or describes representations or descriptions of nudity, sexual conduct, sexual excitement, or sado-masochistic abuse which are patently offensive to prevailing standards in the adult community with respect to what is suitable material for adolescent minors and includes, but is not limited to, patently offensive representations or descriptions of:

1.  Intimate sexual acts, normal or perverted, actual or simulated; or

2.  Masturbation, excretory functions or lewd exhibition of the genitals or genital area.

(b)  "Harmful to minors" shall not include material that, when considered as a whole, possesses serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value for adolescent minors.

(8)  "Material" means anything tangible, whether derived through the medium of reading, observation, or sound, including any picture, photograph, drawing, sculpture, motion picture, film, or similar visual representation or image or any book, pamphlet, magazine, printed matter however reproduced, or sound recording.

(9)  "Promote" means to manufacture, issue, sell, give, provide, deliver, publish, distribute, circulate, disseminate, present, exhibit or advertise, or to offer or agree to do the same.

(10) "Knowingly" means having general knowledge of, or reason to know, or a belief or reasonable ground for belief that warrants further inspection or inquiry.

(11) "School" means any school providing instruction for students in kindergarten through grade 12.

(12) "Sexually explicit" means the quality of any material when it contains erotic depictions of nudity, depicts sexual conduct or sado-masochistic abuse, or contains any explicit and detailed description or narrative account of sexual excitement, sexual conduct, or sado-masochistic abuse. "Sexually explicit" shall not include diagrams about anatomy for scientific education, religious books such as the Bible and the Torah, or content relating to classical works of art.

History:

[18-1514, added 1972, ch. 336, sec. 1, p. 874; am. 1976, ch. 81, sec. 15, p. 267; am. 2024, ch. 327, sec. 1, p. 1080; am. 2026, ch. 343, sec. 1, p. 1335.]