There are a number of crimes that people can commit by accident, from minor crimes such as petty theft to serious crimes like murder. One particularly heinous crime that one can commit by accident is statutory rape. Typically, the reason this happens is that the unwitting perpetrator mistook someone that they flirted with, dated, pursued, or slept with for an adult, usually because the minor is Younger Than They Look, said minor is pretending to be an adult either via disguise or by lying about their age. Needless to say, the perpetrator will likely feel disgusted, embarrassed, and/or horrified once they discover the real age of the person they were pursuing, dating, or slept with.
While intentional pedophiles are almost always depicted as despicable, people who do so by accident can vary in how sympathetic they are portrayed depending on the circumstances. Sympathetic characters will typically be victims of circumstance, such as the minor deliberately tricking them. Unsympathetic characters will often be predatory in a way that they would be creepy even if the people they were harassing weren't underage. Examples of the latter type typically include perverts, stalkers, and rapists.
How sympathetic the underage character tends to be can vary. Characters who are pursued by these types of characters will be viewed as victims of circumstance. If the minor is pretending to be older because they have a crush on the adult or because they want to get laid, their actions will be portrayed as wrong, but the character won't be seen as a bad person. If a character deliberately tries to get someone in trouble by lying about their age, they will almost always be portrayed as evil.
Sub-Trope of Accidental Pervert (where a character gets in trouble by accidentally saying or doing things that come off as sleazy) and Mistaken Age (where a character makes an incorrect assumption about another person's age). Compare Accidental Adultery (where a person unintentionally cheats on their significant other) and Oblivious Pervert (in which someone does perverted actions without understanding why they are perverted). See also Jailbait Taboo (where pursuing sexual relations with minors is openly condemned) and Really 17 Years Old (where an underage character pretends to be an adult). Overlaps with Mistaken for Pedophile if other people assumed that the older party knew about the younger's age. Some fantastical examples might involve a minor using an Older Alter Ego in order to trick someone into dating or sleeping with them. Contrast The Jailbait Wait, where the character is aware that the person they're attracted to is underage, and they wait until age is no longer a (legal) problem before doing anything.
It should be noted in Real Life, even if a person was proven to genuinely believe that a minor was an adult due to the minor using a fake I.D. or some other proof that the minor lied about their age, it is sadly not considered a valid defense (at least in many but not all jurisdictions) and a person will still be legally guilty of statutory rape (though their ignorance may be a factor at sentencing). If a work points this fact out, it overlaps with Shown Their Work. If a story treats ignorance of someone's age as a valid defense, it's a case of Artistic License – Law.
While this type of scenario does happen in real life, it's a very controversial and touchy subject, so No Real Life Examples, Please!.
Examples:
- The 100 Girlfriends Who Really, Really, Really, Really, REALLY Love You: Inverted; when Hahari first met Yaku, she initially assumed that she was a little girl and had a Cuteness Overload while asking for a hug. After realizing that Yaku is more than three times her own age, Hahari profusely apologized for her earlier behavior.
- Recorder and Randsell: Atsushi is an elementary schooler who looks like a grown man, and as a result gets hit on by older girls and adult women, though thankfully they lose interest once they see him acting like his actual age or when they find out how old he actually is.
- Tomo-chan Is a Girl!: The volume 3 extras reveal that this happened to Eddie and Ferris Olston from a combination of Younger Than They Look and poor communication. He was sixteen and assumed from her appearance and other cues that she was about eighteen, but he carelessly didn't ask before they had sex and found out afterwards that she was only thirteen. He was very repentant afterwards. Moreover, Ferris was already pregnant with their daughter Carol, so they went through a lot of trouble before they were both old enough to marry each other and have a stable family.
- Megg, Mogg and Owl: One story had Owl sleep with a girl under the impression that she was a grown woman and become horrified when he realized the girl had just turned 13.
- Tomorrow Stories: Alluded to in the Splash Brannigan story featured in the first 64-page special, where one of the titles depicted on the constantly-changing cover of the noir novel Brannigan is carrying around is The Lady Was, As It Turned Out, 13.
- Ultimate Spider-Man (2000): Unlike most continuities, Felicia Hardy/Black Cat is older than Peter Parker/Spider-Man rather than being the same age, being an adult while Peter is still in high school. Felicia initially had an interest in Spider-Man and at one point decides to give him a kiss but decides to unmask him. Once she finds out that Spider-Man is actually a teenager, Felicia is so disgusted that she vomits on Peter's suit.
- The Great Alicorn Hunt: During the "Windy City" arc, when Rainbow Dash meets Mach One for the first time, she starts flirting (and rather seductively so) with him, until she realizes there's something off about his voice and, after seeing under his hood for the first time, has a panic attack on realizing he's just a kid (fifteen, admittedly, but still underage). Later, when he and Princess Luna meet for the first time, it's indicated that Luna also flirted with him before realizing how young he was, and is rather mortified by the whole situation.
- A combination with Surprise Incest is avoided in How to Break a Family. Arthur is convinced to see a prostitute but is turned off when it turns out she's only fourteen. He finds out a moment later that she's also his sister Kate; the two were separated when their parents divorced fourteen years prior.
- In the NSFW Pokémon fanfiction Opposite Conditions, a Team Plasma grunt who rapes Hilda mistakingly believes that she's either in her late twenties to early thirties and that Elaine is her daughter. In actuality, Hilda is an eleven-year-old early bloomer, and Elaine is Hilda's teenaged older sister who only looks like a child.
- In Smoke and Mirrors
, Harry Potter, who's nineteen years old, flirts with Chloe Sullivan, a fifteen-year-old, under the assumption that she's a college student because she looks like onenote . Harry briefly imagines himself in prison once Chloe tells him her age.
- Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead: Gus propositions Sue Ellen several times, to which she refuses, and he has no intention of letting up. He doesn't know it, but she's 17. When Sue Ellen makes her public confession at the climax, revealing her age, he looks like he's about to choke.
- The First Wives Club: Exploited; Elise uncovers evidence that the young woman Bill left her for is actually only 16, and shows it to Bill. Bill is horrified when he learns this and knows it will put him in serious legal trouble, which gives Elise the perfect leverage to blackmail him.
- Liar Liar: When Fletcher's inability to lie for 24 hours completely torpedoes the most important court case of his career, he still manages to win the case by exploiting this trope. He reveals to the court that his client Samantha Cole lied about her age so she could marry without her parents' permission — she was actually underage when she married Richard Cole, so the prenuptial agreement they signed isn't legally binding.
- Mallrats: Shannon Hamilton was filmed having sex with Tricia Jones, whom Brody informs the police is only 15. Shannon protests as he's arrested that he believed the girl was 36. Downplayed in that Tricia was played by then-20-year-old Renee Humphrey, so it might be believable that Shannon thought the girl was older, but in no way did she appear as old as he claimed.
- In Old School, Mitch slept with a girl named Darcie, but they haven't done anything even though she clearly wanted to. Not only does he find out that she's his boss's daughter, but she's also a high school graduate. She mouths "sorry" to Mitch for lying about her age while in her dad's office. His boss never finds out, and the two pretend that they don't know each other. This nearly got Mitch in trouble with his love interest due to Poor Communication Kills and Not What It Looks Like.
- Trainspotting: Renton is horrified that Diane — the girl who picked him up at a nightclubnote — is actually fifteen and living with her parents (he thought they were her flatmates). She threatens to report him to the police if he doesn't continue the relationship.
- In the John Grisham novel The Firm, Mitch needs to hire a P.I., and his brother Ray (who's in prison for manslaughter) recommends Eddie Lomax, a former cellmate of his who was arrested for rape. When Eddie and Mitch meet, Eddie very quickly clarifies that the actual charge was statutory rape - according to him, the girl was 17 but he thought she was 25, and the whole thing was some kind of Frame-Up.
- Played for Drama in Haunted (2005); Mr. Whittier, while looking like a very old man, is actually a young man with progeria (abnormally rapid aging), who uses his tragic condition to convince attractive volunteer carers to have sex with him. After it's done, he starts blackmailing his partners, revealing that he is thirteen, and can get them sent to prison for statutory rape.
- Big Love: Old Man Marrying a Child situation is extremely common in the FLDS religion. Nikki, for example, married JJ while she was underage, and Rhonda was a literal child when she married Roman. However, Season 5 reveals that Bill's youngest wife, Margene (who already has a lot of conflict fitting in with the family due to her perceived immaturity), actually lied about her age to marry him. She claimed she was 18 (the age of consent in Utah) to marry him; she was actually 16.
- Californication: In the pilot episode, sexaholic Hank Moody picks up a girl at a bar who later turns out to be 16note . To make things worse, she ALSO turns out to be his new (kind-of?) niece, namely being the daughter of his ex-wife's new husband. She uses this to blackmail him until his mistake is finally exposed and he is charged with statutory rape. Being a writer, he also bases his new book on the event, which is later turned into a film.
- Friends: Monica dates Ethan, who tells her he's a college senior. After having sex, he informs her he lied about his age and is actually a high school senior and 17 years old. Monica is disturbed and breaks up with him.
- Gilmore Girls: Played for Laughs in the pilot, when a 20-something guy traveling through Stars Hollow hits on both the Gilmore girls, separately. He is shocked to find they are actually mother and daughter, due to their close age. This doesn't deter him, even going as far as to mention the other guy he's traveling with, but finding out that Rory is 16 does, and he bolts from Luke's like the place is on fire.
- Hannah Montana: In "People Who Use People", Miley enacts an Operation: Jealousy ploy by hanging out and later accepting a date with a student named Willis, who is going to graduate soon. Miley hopes to make Jake Ryan jealous by seeing her with the high-school senior and dump his current girlfriend. Unfortunately, the boy is revealed to be only 11 years old despite looking as old as Miley and her friends, and Willis is actually graduating from elementary school. Miley is promptly embarrassed by the blunder, especially when Jake shows up and sees Willis playing around with the other kids his age. The following day, after Miley admits that she accepted the date to try and make Jake jealous, he reveals that he enacted his own jealousy ploy on Miley, making her be jealous about his relationship so that he can ask her out.
- One episode of The Inbetweeners has the boys flirt with a group of dolled-up girls sitting around late at night. Said girls scowl at them before revealing that they are thirteen.
- Lie to Me: One episode involved a case where a college football star slept with a high school girl at a frat party. He claimed he had no idea she was underage, and the Lightman was hired to determine if he was telling the truth. It turned out that she had lied about her age to get into the party and he had no idea.
- Maniac Mansion (1990): In "Love, Turner Style", Turner falls in love with an adult woman named Rose, who is forced to call their relationship off after learning that Turner only looks like an adult and is actually five years old.
- Ugly Betty: Daniel sleeps with a Sensual Slav model named Petra and her sister Lena, who then reveals that Petra is 16 and she's actually her mother. They blackmail Daniel into making Petra the cover model of the next issue, or they go to the police and the media. It turns out Petra is actually 20 and Daniel doesn't have to risk prison.
- DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince's "Parents Just Don't Understand" has a scenario where Fresh Prince picks up a cute girl in his parents' new Porsche while they're away on vacation. After a few minutes of joyriding and the girl putting the moves on Prince, they get caught and arrested by the cops for speeding, where he finds out that the girl he picked up was actually a 12-year-old runaway.
- Gary Pucket and the Union Gap's "Young Girl" is sung from the perspective of someone who just realized the woman he loves is much younger than she presents herself (whether she's actually underage is unclear, but there's a significant age difference regardless). He begs her to leave him because he knows their relationship is wrong, but he loves her too much to end things himself.
- One of the things the narrator complains about in Theory of a Deadman's "Hate My Life":
"I hate that I can't tell when a girl's underage. I tell her she's a nice piece of ass, and then her daddy punches me in the face"
- Rock of Ages: In the "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue, jerkass rock star Stacee Jaxx's career is ended, and he flees the country after it's revealed that one of the groupies he took advantage of during the story was underage.
- Etra chan saw it!: Hiragi
is a 46-year-old man who lusts after and stalks Yuzuriha, an eleven-year-old girl, mistakingly assuming that she's a twenty-three-year-old woman due to her being an early bloomer and that her stepsister Yuri, the actual twenty-three-year-old, is an eleven-year-old due to her being a late bloomer. When Hiragi comes to Yuzuriha's school to propose to her, everyone thinks he's a pedophile because he proposed to a child, with Hiragi having to clarify to the police that he honestly mistook Yuzuriha for an adult.
- How It Should Have Ended: In How The Little Mermaid Should Have Ended, during Eric and Ariel's wedding, Ariel states she's sixteen, causing Eric to freak out because Ariel never told him. He then runs away and tells Ariel that he'll be willing to meet up again in two years.
- Beloved L: The comic starts with Wei Wei picking up Ding Yi at a bar and discovering after they've slept together that Ding Yi is sixteen. One of Wei Wei's coworkers finds out about it and uses it as blackmail.
- In a very early Least I Could Do strip, Rayne once unknowingly slept with a high school girl he picked up at a bar. When the mother found out, she tried to press charges but the judge ended up dismissing the case on the grounds that her daughter had used a fake ID to enter a bar so Rayne could not reasonably be expected to know she was underage.
- Our Little Adventure: Trevoricus the gnome is on the wrong side of the law due to an incident when he joined a traveling caravan of halflings and had the bad luck to proposition
a woman who turned out to be the one human child in the camp.
- BoJack Horseman: One of Princess Carolyn's boyfriends was Vincent Adultman, who's actually three kids disguised as an adult, with Bojack being the only one aware of "Vincent's" actual age. While she does break up with Vincent later on, it's not because she discovered his real age but because the relationship didn't work out.
- Family Guy: In the episode "McStroke", Stewie disguises himself as a high schooler and ends up dating Connie. At one point, Stewie and Connie almost have sex but Connie loses interest when she sees Stewie's small penis. In revenge, Stewie decides to reveal that he's really a baby and frames Connie as being a pedophile.
Stewie: Look! This girl is making out with a baby! A nude baby!
- South Park: Towards the beginning of the episode "Cartman Joins NAMBLA", Cartman tries to make friends with adults on an online chatroom. At one point, he meets up with his teacher Mr. Garrison — this causes the police to get the wrong idea of what's going on and arrest Garrison, who's mortified and claims that he thought that he was talking to someone his age.
- The Venture Bros.: Dermot Fictel's mother got Rusty Venture to sleep with her by lying about her age. Her mother was infuriated that Rusty had sex with and impregnated her daughter, while Rusty was shocked that he had been seduced by a 15-year-old girl.
