NO Justice
Louisiana’s blatantly racist, queerphobic and transphobic application of certain prostitution laws compelled us to launch the NO Justice campaign in 2008. We had realized that a majority of our clients who had or were engaging in survival sex work – clients who were predominantly poor, Black, and/or members of the LGBTQ community – were facing predatory policing and unequal prosecution and sentencing under the Crime Against Nature-Solicitation (CAN-S) law (now LA RS 14:89.2).
The CAN-S law prohibited the “solicitation by a human being of another with the intent to engage in any unnatural carnal copulation”, defined as anal or oral sex, for compensation. Apart from a felony conviction with the possibility of six months of incarceration and a fine of $500 for a first offense conviction, the harshest consequence of being caught in its net was to be placed on the sex offender registry for fifteen years to life. Once on the registry it was more difficult to access social services, acquire housing and employment, or even volunteer at a child’s school. The requirement essentially branded all registrants with the words SEX OFFENDER in bold, red letters across all identification.
CAN-S charges were overwhelmingly brought against poor, Black, and LGBTQ sex workers. We filed a federal civil rights suit to challenge the constitutionality of the law and remove the registry requirement in 2011 on the grounds that it furthered marginalization and discrimination. We then filed a civil lawsuit against the state with the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), Andrea J. Ritchie, Esq., and the Stuart H. Smith Law Clinic of Loyola University New Orleans College of Law to remove nearly 800 individuals charged with CAN-S from the sex offender registry. At the time, almost 40% of the entire sex offender registry was from CAN-S convictions, 75% of registrants were women, and 79% were Black. The flagrant disparity in the application of the law was undeniable. A year later our office was firebombed. There was little investigation by law enforcement.
