(a) No person shall procure an inmate for a house of prostitution, or by promises, threats, violence or by any device or scheme, cause, induce, persuade or encourage a person to become an inmate of a house of prostitution, or shall procure a place as inmate in a house of prostitution for a person. No person shall, by promises, threats, violence or any device or scheme cause, induce, persuade or encourage an inmate of a house of prostitution to remain therein as such inmate; or shall, by fraud or artifice, or by duress of person or goods, or by abuse of any position of confidence or authority, procure any person to become an inmate of a house of ill fame, to enter any place in which prostitution is encouraged or allowed within this Municipality, or to come into or leave this Municipality for the purpose of prostitution, or shall procure any person to become an inmate of a house of ill fame within this Municipality or to come into or leave this Municipality for the purpose of prostitution; or shall receive or give or agree to receive or give any money or thing of value for procuring or attempting to procure any person to become an inmate of a house of ill fame within this Municipality, or to come into or leave this Municipality for the purpose of prostitution.
It shall not be a defense to prosecution for any of the acts prohibited in this section that any part of such act or acts shall have been committed outside of this Municipality, and the offense shall in such case be deemed and alleged to have been committed and the offender tried and punished in the municipality or county in which the prostitution was intended to be practiced, or in which the offense was consummated, or any overt act in furtherance of the offense was committed.
Any such person shall be a competent witness in any prosecution under this section to testify for or against the accused as to any transaction, or as to conversation with the accused, or by the accused with another person or persons in his or her presence, notwithstanding his or her having married the accused before or after the violation of any of the provisions of this section, whether called as a witness during the existence of the marriage or after its dissolution. The act or state of marriage shall not be a defense to any violation of this section.
(b) Whoever violates this section is guilty of a misdemeanor for the first offense unless the inmate referred to in this section is a minor.
(W. Va. Code §
61-8-7)