Hawaii Law Allows Police to Have Sex With Prostitutes They Are Investigating *clears throat*

But advocates say that aggressive arrest practices only serve to victimize sex workers and compromise their safety

Police in Hawaii are fighting to defend an exemption in a the state’s prostitution law that allows undercover officers to have sex with the sex workers they’re targeting in an investigation.

Testifying in support of the exemption, Honolulu Police Maj. Jerry Inouye said the policy is necessary for investigations, though police will not disclose if and how often it has been invoked. “Because if prostitution suspects, pimps and other people are privy to that information, they’re going to know exactly how far the undercover officer can and cannot go,” he told the House Judiciary Committee.

When questioned about the potential for police abuse of sex workers, the Honolulu police department insisted that it has protocols in place to regulate itself. “All allegations of misconduct are investigated and the appropriate disciplinary action taken,” Michelle Yu, Honolulu police spokeswoman, commented to the Associated Press in an email. But, as the AP notes, the disclosure laws for police misconduct in Hawaii make it “impossible to know if an on-duty officer had faced discipline or accusations of having sex with a prostitute.”

Advocates, lawmakers and law enforcement officials have criticized the law, calling it unnecessary and exploitative. Derek Marsh, who trains California police in best practices on human trafficking cases, called the exemption ”antiquated at best.”

The law “doesn’t help your case, and at worst you further traumatize someone,” he told the AP. “And do you think he or she is going to trust a cop again?”

But not all people in the sex industry are victims of trafficking, and the Hawaii law jeopardizes their lives and livelihoods, too. The reality of sex work is that it is work; the people who do it should be free from harassment, coercion and violence — including from law enforcement.

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