Word: cotner
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...Whoever commits the abominable and detestable crime against nature with mankind or beast shall be deemed guilty of sodomy." In such indirect language, an Indiana statute makes oral or anal intercourse a crime. Even if he knew about the law, Charles Cotner of Jasper County, Ind., could hardly believe that it covered married couples in the privacy of their bedrooms...
...never had an idyllic marriage," says Cotner, but "whatever quarrels we had were always made up amicably after we'd had a chance to cool off." At least it remained that way through ten years of marriage. Then, in 1965, a family squabble took longer than usual to simmer down. While still angry, Mrs. Cotner decided to get back at her husband by filing a sodomy charge against him. But before the case came to court, Mrs. Cotner changed her mind and tried to withdraw her complaint. She was too late; the state said that it was a criminal...
Closed Doors. The same thing could have happened to Cotner in most other states. Virtually all of them have anti-sodomy statutes similar to Indiana's-many phrased with matching euphemism. Illinois and a few others except all consenting adults, and most law-enforcement agencies do not bother with such cases. Cotner nonetheless faced a long term, since convicted sex offenders rarely win parole until most of their sentence...
...Publisher Hugh Hefner's Playboy Foundation helped underwrite a habeas corpus petition. On the narrow legal ground that he was allowed to plead guilty without having been informed that he could have attacked the sodomy law constitutionally, the U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals has just thrown out Cotner's conviction by a 2-to-l vote. He is now free, after having served three years of his sentence, and is living with his grandmother in Illinois...