In the News

(Amy Alonzo | Fernley Leader-Courier) – When Phil Wooley sees a problem, he grabs the bull by the horns and takes charge. So, when he heard fellow Dayton resident David Mickelsen needed a kidney transplant, Wooley underwent tests to see if he was a match – and he was.

In the seven years Mickelsen has been battling kidney failure, Wooley was the first possible match.

“I was in a bit of shock and amazement, likely due to the fact that I had been searching for a donor for such a long time without any offers, and those who have tried being disqualified,” Mickelsen said.

Mickelsen has been on dialysis for five years for kidney failure, and he also suffers from a benign brain tumor that, despite an operation and radiation, still affects him.

Wooley, 41, is an outspoken graphic artist for the Moonlight Bunny Ranch who also…

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(Ryan Sanders | Dallas Morning News) – An anti-human trafficking activist in North Texas has filed a federal lawsuit against the state of Nevada in a bid to end legalized prostitution there. The complaint, filed Monday morning in Reno by Rebekah Charleston, contends that Nevada’s legal brothels are in violation of federal law preventing interstate commerce in prostitution, and that the market created by those brothels contributes to illegal sex trafficking. It names the state of Nevada, its Legislature and Gov. Steve Sisolak as defendants.

. . .

But others will probably not be sympathetic. Sex is big business in Nevada. According to a 2005 report in the Nevada Law Journal, brothels pull in about $25 million per year. The counties, rather than the state, collect licensing fees, property taxes, work-card fees, investigation fees and liquor license fees, totaling about $10 million a year.

Christina Parreira is a doctoral candidate at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, and a former licensed sex worker. She called Guinasso a predator whose motivation is publicity.

“We are already a maligned and stigmatized group,” Parreira said of sex workers. “We don’t deserve this. We deserve to be left alone, to work, make money, and live our lives like every other American.”

Charleston’s case seems to hinge on two factors…

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(Miranda Willson | Las Vegas Sun) – Representatives of Nevada’s legal brothel industry say they’re prepared to fight against two efforts to ban brothels statewide that were announced this week.

State Sen. Joe Hardy, R-Boulder City, said he will file legislation to end the decades-old brothel industry in Nevada on Wednesday, the Associated Press reported. . . .

Hardy’s announcement came on the heels of another potential threat to the industry in Nevada’s rural counties. On Monday, former prostitute and human trafficking victim Rebekah Charleston filed a federal lawsuit against Nevada, alleging that the state-sanctioned industry facilitates sex trafficking and violates federal laws.

. . .

Considering Charleston’s lawsuit and Hardy’s bill, representatives from the legal brothel industry say they are prepared to campaign against any statewide ban, as they did leading up to the referendum in Lyon County.

Lance Gilman, owner of the Mustang Ranch brothel in Storey County, insisted that sex trafficking does not take place in the state’s highly regulated legal industry. Women who work in the state’s brothels must undergo background checks to determine their age, criminal history, immigration status and other details. They also partake in routine medical examinations for STIs and other transmittable diseases.

“The ladies that work in our legal industry choose to come to our places,” Gilman said. “They primarily do it because they’re safe, [and] the customers are safe.”

Criminalizing prostitution statewide, Gilman added, would push many legal prostitutes into illegal sex work, including in Las Vegas, where prostitution is outlawed but remains more common than anywhere else in the state.

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Sex Workers Call Foul Given Her Track Record; Demand Apology And Reparations As Evidence Of Good Faith

(Maxine Doogan | ESPLER Project)  – A sex work activist group, the Erotic Service Providers Legal Education And Research Project (ESPLERP), is not impressed today to hear presidential candidate Kamala Harris in an interview with The Root (http://tinyurl.com/yy2kgo5t) say that she is now open to the decriminalization of sex work-for some.

“Given her history, we need to know what Kamala Harris really believes,” said Maxine Doogan of ESPLERP. “At one point in the interview she sounds like an old school anti-prostitutist from the 80s – using epithets like “pimps” and “johns”. Then she says she is open to decriminalization of sex work. She needs to clarify her position – starting with an unequivocal statement that she supports the decriminalization of sex work for all consenting adults.”

Harris has a decidedly mixed history on sex work…

• In 2007, when running for reelection San Francisco District Attorney, Harris sought the endorsement of the Harvey Milk Democratic Club, and described herself in a public meeting as “an honorary sex worker”.
• In 2008, Harris campaigned against Prop K, a city wide ballot measure to stop the criminalization of prostitution. This was despite the San Francisco Democratic County Central Committee official position was in favor. During that campaign she made ludicrous claims that decriminalizing prostitution would open San Francisco to serious crimes like rape, robbery, extortion, kidnapping and murder (http://tinyurl.com/y5vw9oxs).
• As San Francisco District Attorney Harris was found in violation of San Francisco’s open government law.  The  Sunshine Ordinance Task Force found that she had not responded to defense attorney requests for disclosure, for example about police disciplinary records, in cases prosecuted by her office against sex workers.
• As California Attorney General, Harris used the power of her office to go after Backpage – an online advertising platform where sex workers could advertise and negotiate without police harassment. When her first lawsuit against Backpage was dismissed, she filed again, making her attack on Backpage part of her US Senate campaign.
• Also while California Attorney General, Harris declined to investigate Bay Area police departments, despite their long history of exploiting and extorting sex workers, and despite the ongoing scandal of police interactions with an Oakland underage sex worker.
• In the Senate, Harris voted for the FOSTA bill which shut down online platforms used by sex workers for advertising, support and sustenance, in effect stripping sex workers of our online speech rights.

“Kamala Harris will say anything popular to get an endorsement or get elected,” said Claire Alwyne of ESPLERP. “She is good with empty words about protecting women, but her actions have consistently harmed sex workers – mostly poor women, women of color, and trans women. For example, her attacks on Backpage and her vote to pass #FOSTA  forced sex workers back onto the streets, where they are vulnerable to violence and extortion. So if Harris is really sincere about decriminalization, she should start with a detailed policy position making it clear that she supports the full decriminalization of sex work for all consenting adults – and rejects the Nordic Model criminalization of our clients which has been discredited by Amnesty International (http://tinyurl.com/kvafj88).”

“Kamala Harris should apologize – and then start talking about reparations for sex workers,” said Reada Wong of ESPLERP. “Is she going to work to repeal FOSTA? How does she propose to compensate the sex workers her actions have harmed, who were pushed into poverty, who lost their housing or child custody? How does she propose to expunge the criminal records of the sex workers prosecuted on her watch?  Will she be returning campaign contributions she’s received from anti-prostitution groups? And will she find funding for pro sex work groups like ESPLERP, so we can start dismantling decades of stigma and discrimination in State and Federal legislatures that politicians like her have furthered their careers on?  Harris should put her money where her mouth is.”

The Erotic Service Providers Legal, Education and Research Project (ESPLERP) is a diverse community-based coalition advancing sexual privacy rights through litigation, education, and research. Support us at www.litigatetoemancipate.com.

(Ryan Tarinelli | Associated Press) – Nevada’s legal brothels are holdovers from the state’s Wild West past that draw customers and the curious to the rural areas where they are scattered.

Republican state Sen. Joe Hardy says brothels have no place in the state and attract women with few economic options who get stuck in an abusive industry.

“It’s not an easy exit for someone,” he said. “So I’d like to give them hope, that not only can they get out, but they can get an opportunity to get retrained.”

Hardy plans legislation that would ban brothels in the only state where they are legal — though even he acknowledges the bill might lack support among colleagues who see the brothels as an economic boon for rural counties.

Sex workers and other backers of the brothels say they’re ready to fight the measure. They argue a ban would hurt struggling rural economies and drive women working in the world’s oldest profession out of a regulated environment that requires regular STD tests and into dangerous street prostitution.

“It’s either going to happen in the streets and in Vegas and in the hotels, or it’s going to happen in a safe, legal atmosphere where women such as myself can feel safe and protected,” said Christina Parreira, a sex worker who formerly worked in multiple brothels.

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(Madam Bella Cummins) – Yet again, I am reminded of Jason Guinasso’s misunderstanding of this subject matter. I understand his wanting to lash out and fix something that he thinks is wrong. However, it’s confused.

Once again, with loaded verbiage, he fails to understand the difference between the nature of legal courtesanship in Nevada and illegal prostitution. It proves again that there is a real need for education, to erase these stereotypes and misunderstandings and to guide our thinking about a new direction.

That is what the Onesta Foundation is about and that forms the basis of our advocacy for enlightened approaches to well-regulated sensual services. In the rural counties of Nevada, we have proved that it works, that it improves public health and safety and empowers communities.

The Onesta Foundation stands with the Governor, The Nevada Legislature and the State of Nevada in this case, but most stolidly with the workers, the courtesans, who are being marginalized and stigmatized by the ignorance of misplaced judgement.

The plaintiff in this case tells of her experience of being forced into prostitution, a crime by any standard, in the state of Texas, and of being brought to Nevada to work illegally in Las Vegas, also a crime with heavy penalties. Then she tells of being forced, by her pimp, to seek work in a licensed brothel as a punishment for some undisclosed infraction. This is a very telling statement, entirely misinterpreted by the Guinasso team.

I liken it to someone who gets behind the wheel of a car having had too much to drink. Their decisions are impaired and there are consequences in their misdirected actions. In this case, the strong drink is judgement.

What is obviously needing to be addressed here are the illegal activities in areas where brothels are prohibited. I think about these ladies, who are out working one convention to the next. There is no reason to believe that their clients and those ladies are safe. They are unregulated, beyond the reach of public safety, and therein lies the problem.

In Jason Guinasso’s fervor, he has brought to everyone’s attention that change is required, so I thank him for that. I still want to help him to understand that his efforts are misdirected. Having been shown the door by the people of Lyon County in the last election, his twisting of the relationship between local, state and federal governments smells of desperation perfume. He’s got it backwards.

There is another way to look at all of this, through the lens of the Onesta tradition of fairness, honesty and virtue in all human relations. People get to make their own choices, absolutely. These women, who work in sensual services in the safe places designed by the state, deserve empowerment in our culture without judgment and without repercussions, should they make that choice.

The powerful, independent and entrepreneurial women who provide fun, safe and healthy sensual services look askance at those who claim to be saving them from something or saving them from themselves. It makes them angry and fires them up when they get the feeling their freedom of choice is being disrespected and taken away from them. They are their own personal power.

As Executive Director of the Onesta Foundation, a Nevada 501c3 non-profit entity, I urge the courts to reject this suit on the grounds that state’s rights should prevail and that this suit is frivolous.