1. A dwelling where people carry on activities that are a nuisance to the neighborhood. [Cases: Disorderly House
1. C.J.S. Disorderly Houses § 2.]
2. A dwelling where people conduct criminal or immoral activities. • Examples are brothels and drug houses.
— Also termed (more narrowly) bawdy house; house of prostitution; house of ill fame; lewd house; assignation house; house of assignation.
“The keeping of one type of disorderly house — the bawdy house — is punished because it violates the social interest in maintaining proper standards of morality and decency…. As included here a house may be disorderly for other reasons. Any house in which disorderly persons are permitted to congregate, and to disturb the tranquillity of the neighborhood by fighting, quarreling, swearing or any other type of disorder, is a disorderly house; and the keeping thereof is a misdemeanor at common law.” Rollin M. Perkins & Ronald N. Boyce, Criminal Law 487 (3d ed. 1982).
