Search Result for "criminal conversation":
Wordnet 3.0

NOUN (1)

1. extramarital sex that willfully and maliciously interferes with marriage relations;
- Example: "adultery is often cited as grounds for divorce"
[syn: adultery, criminal conversation, fornication]


The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:

Criminal \Crim"i*nal\ (kr?m"?-nal), a. [L. criminalis, fr. crimen: cf. F. criminel. See Crime.] 1. Guilty of crime or sin. [1913 Webster] The neglect of any of the relative duties renders us criminal in the sight of God. --Rogers. [1913 Webster] 2. Involving a crime; of the nature of a crime; -- said of an act or of conduct; as, criminal carelessness. [1913 Webster] Foppish and fantastic ornaments are only indications of vice, not criminal in themselves. --Addison. [1913 Webster] 3. Relating to crime; -- opposed to civil; as, the criminal code. [1913 Webster] The officers and servants of the crown, violating the personal liberty, or other right of the subject . . . were in some cases liable to criminal process. --Hallam. [1913 Webster] Criminal action (Law), an action or suit instituted to secure conviction and punishment for a crime. Criminal conversation (Law), unlawful intercourse with a married woman; adultery; -- usually abbreviated, crim. con. Criminal law, the law which relates to crimes. [1913 Webster]
WordNet (r) 3.0 (2006):

criminal conversation n 1: extramarital sex that willfully and maliciously interferes with marriage relations; "adultery is often cited as grounds for divorce" [syn: adultery, criminal conversation, fornication]
Bouvier's Law Dictionary, Revised 6th Ed (1856):

CRIMINAL CONVERSATION, crim. law. This phrase is usually employed to denote the crime of adultery. It is abbreviated crim. con. Bac. Ab. Marriage, E 2; 4 Blackf. R. 157. 2. The remedy for criminal conversation is, by an action on the case for damages. That the plaintiff connived, or assented to, his wife's infidelity, or that he prostituted her for gain, is a complete answer to the action. See Connivance. But the facts that the wife's character for chastity was bad before the plaintiff married her; that he lived with her after he knew of the criminal intimacy with the defendant; that he had connived at her intimacy with other men;, or that the plaintiff had been false to his wife, only go in mitigation of damages. 4 N. Hamp. R. 501. 3. The wife cannot maintain an action for criminal conversation with her husband; and for this, among other reasons, because her husband, who is particeps criminis, must be joined with her as plaintiff.