# Pre-Lawrence Sodomy Convictions?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pre-lawrence-sodomy-convictions/585666>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [June 16, 2011, 6:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pre-lawrence-sodomy-convictions/585666 "2011-06-16T06:20:42Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Jim\_B](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jim_b/32/4338_2.png) [@Jim\_B](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jim_B)\
**Post date:** [June 16, 2011, 6:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pre-lawrence-sodomy-convictions/585666/1 "2011-06-16T06:20:42Z")

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I was just wondering how many homosexual sodomy convictions there were in the US after _Bowers v. Hardwick_, but pre-[Lawrence v. Texas](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_v._Texas).

Yes, I know there are many convictions where there are other elements involved, like force, doing it in public, or doing it with an underage or vulnerable person. So let me make my variables clear here: **private sexual behavior, between consenting, competent adults**.

And please don’t tell me there were none:) (with _Lawrence_ there was at least _one_:)).

🙂

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**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\
**Post date:** [June 16, 2011, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pre-lawrence-sodomy-convictions/585666/2 "2011-06-16T16:22:32Z")

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I suspect _the answer to the precise question you ask in the OP_ is “Very few.” That requires some comment, however.

_Lawrence_ is a much narrower decision than the facile “Sodomy convictions are unconstitutional” summary it is often given. As your OP recognizes, it relates to private contact between consenting adults. As construed in case law, the Fourth Amendment right to privacy relates to one’s dwelling place, with a few reasonable extensions thereto, not to wherever one might find oneself. There is no Fourth Amendment expectation of privacy in a men’s room stall, a secluded area of a public park, a parked car on a back road, etc. And while I didn’t follow the stories at all closely, I know there were instances of police ‘stings’ of gay people making contact in such places – one news story of such a sting that sticks in my mind was in Roanoke VA not long before _Lawrence_ came down. It should perhaps be noted in passing that any instance of an underage partner, any suggestion of actual or potential coercion, etc., also are not within the narrowly crafted _Lawrence_ rule. (Please don’t read this as in any way homophobic; I’m simply noting the exceptions Kennedy spelled out in addressing the question.)

So… Were there arrests for homosexual activity during the years separating the _Bowers_ and _awrence_ decisions? Yes, in some parts of the country qauite a lot of them; in others, not as much. Were they ones that the _Lawrence_ decision would have voided, where Fourth Amendment expectation of privacy existed? By and large, no; they were in general arrests made in relatively secluded venues that were ‘public’ in the legal sense.

And no, I cannot quantify or provide cites for my answer – I’m simply basing it on what I remember of news stories about such arrests and the terms that were spelled out in _Lawrence_. Anyone with the ability to locate and sort numbers to provide a more definitive answer, please do so.