(a) A person commits parentage fraud who:

Attorney's Note

Under the Tennessee Code, punishments for crimes depend on the classification. In the case of this section:
ClassPrisonFine
class B misdemeanorup to 6 monthsup to $500
For details, see Tenn. Code § 40-35-111
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Terms Used In Tennessee Code 39-14-111

  • Deprive: means to:
    (A) Withhold property from the owner permanently or for such a period of time as to substantially diminish the value or enjoyment of the property to the owner. See Tennessee Code 39-11-106
  • Fraud: Intentional deception resulting in injury to another.
  • Fraud: means as used in normal parlance and includes, but is not limited to, deceit, trickery, misrepresentation and subterfuge, and shall be broadly construed to accomplish the purposes of this title. See Tennessee Code 39-11-106
  • Person: includes the singular and the plural and means and includes any individual, firm, partnership, copartnership, association, corporation, governmental subdivision or agency, or other organization or other legal entity, or any agent or servant thereof. See Tennessee Code 39-11-106
  • Property: means anything of value, including, but not limited to, money, real estate, tangible or intangible personal property, including anything severed from land, library material, contract rights, choses-in-action, interests in or claims to wealth, credit, admission or transportation tickets, captured or domestic animals, food and drink, electric or other power. See Tennessee Code 39-11-106
(1) Seeks to legally establish another individual as the biological parent of a child in the person’s custody with intent to deprive the individual of property or to prevent the child’s actual biological parent from exercising parental rights to the child and the person knows or reasonably should know that the individual is not the child’s biological parent; or
(2) Seeks to be legally established as a child’s parent based on the person’s status as a biological parent of the child and the person knows or reasonably should know that the person is not the child’s biological parent.
(b) Parentage fraud is a Class B misdemeanor.
(c) Subsection (a) does not apply when:

(1) The child involved was conceived as a result of an act that would be aggravated rape, as defined in § 39-13-502; rape, as defined in § 39-13-503; rape of a child, as defined in § 39-13-522; especially aggravated rape, as defined in § 39-13-534; or especially aggravated rape of a child, as defined in § 39-13-535;
(2) The child involved has been or is in the process of being adopted; or
(3) The victim of the offense was the defendant‘s spouse at the time of the offense.
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