That has to be deliberate – as deliberate as the obit for Leopold or Loeb that said that his death in prison (at the hands of another inmate who made sexual advances that he turned down) was “the first time someone was killed for ending a sentence with a proposition.”
I’m still surprised, and more than a little suspicious. I’d expect any sort of description, especially back then, to be either completely nonspecific, or to call it “Sodomy”.
Not just some backwater town. I’m pretty sure those laws still exist all throughout America. Maybe even in your own home state. Hopefully a legal expert can come by and give a more thorough (and accurate) explanation.
By and large they simply choose not to enforce them.
Since Lawrence v. Texas it is illegal to enforce laws against private consensual sodomy. Criminal sodomy (by which I mean rape), of course can still be a crime.