The announced pregnancy of Jamie Lynn Spears - the 16-year-old sister of pop princess Britney Spears - raised some legal questions concerning the consensual sex among teens, CNN reported Thursday.

The issue was touched after Spears told OK! Magazine that she's pregnant and that the father is her longtime 18-year-old boyfriend Casey Aldridge.

There has been no public talk of criminal prosecution in the case. Consensual sex between the two may well have been legal, depending on where and when it took place.

But critics of the nation's statutory rape laws say that laws that are ignored in some cases can be used to put other teens in prison and land them on sex-offender registries.

In the state of Louisiana, where Spears lives, it is a misdemeanor for someone age 17 to 19 to have consensual sex with someone age 15 to 17 if the difference between their ages is more than two years.

In California, where she sometimes tapes her television show, it's a misdemeanor to have sex with someone younger than 18 if the offender is less than three years older. Someone more than three years older could be charged with a felony.

Spears, who turned 16 on April 4 and says she is 12 weeks into her pregnancy, told the magazine she plans to raise her child in Louisiana, "so it can have a normal family life."

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