Pen. Code, § 181 · Chapter 7. Other Offenses Against Public Justice
Pen. Code, § 181
Text — As published in the Legislative Counsel's database, tables dated October 18, 2026 (pubinfo_2025.zip)
Every person who holds, or attempts to hold, any person in involuntary servitude, or assumes, or attempts to assume, rights of ownership over any person, or who sells, or attempts to sell, any person to another, or receives money or anything of value, in consideration of placing any person in the custody, or under the power or control of another, or who buys, or attempts to buy, any person, or pays money, or delivers anything of value, to another, in consideration of having any person placed in his or her custody, or under his or her power or control, or who knowingly aids or assists in any manner any one thus offending, is punishable by imprisonment pursuant to subdivision (h) of Section 1170 for two, three or four years.
Notes and commentary — not statutory text
History
Amended by Stats. 2011, Ch. 15, Sec. 271. (AB 109) Effective April 4, 2011. Operative October 1, 2011, by Sec. 636 of Ch. 15, as amended by Stats. 2011, Ch. 39, Sec. 68.
Source of truth
- Edition
- As published in the Legislative Counsel's database, tables dated October 18, 2026 (pubinfo_2025.zip)
- Official file
- https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection.xhtml?lawCode=PEN§ionNum=181.
- Text hash
- sha256 61425a2c62b1bdd1f80e23c615674532fa0c32e05ac48fc8be60a1981f17504a
- Composed by
- compose_ca.py 2026-10-22: the Legislative Counsel's CAML content files read by a tokenizer (caml_readers.reader_a); an independent xml.etree reading (caml_readers.reader_b) agrees on every section
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