You may not be aware that police officers across the country are currently able to have sexual contact with sex workers before arresting them. Don’t worry, you aren’t alone if you weren’t privy. Apparently 90 percent of people in Alaska didn’t know either. Which makes it all the more shocking that police in the northern-most state are fighting for their “right” to continue the practice.

Glamour reported that state lawmakers have been in an ongoing battle with the state’s police force over a proposed bill that would outlaw what many sex worker’s rights advocates consider to be traumatic sexual assault. 

“It’s incredibly traumatic to be tricked into having sex with someone who stops in the middle and puts you in handcuffs and takes you against your will to be locked up in a jail cell,” explained Terra Burns, one of the founders of Community United for Safety and Protection (CUSP). “Women have told me that years later they still have PTSD symptoms when they see a police car.”

The police officers’ side of the argument has been convoluted, at best. When a earlier version of the bill came out that would’ve officially outlawed sexual contact with workers during investigation, they claimed to be personally offended that someone would even suspect this of occurring. Anchorage Police Department Deputy Chief Sean Case states that the police force already has rules in place to prevent this from happening.

Next, officers started to support the bill mostly because they thought it wouldn’t be taken seriously. However, they’ve vocally condemned it ever since it gained traction and the Hayes Research Group revealed that 92 percent of Alaskan residents didn’t know sexual contact between police officers and sex workers was even happening and 90 percent felt it should be illegal.

“(In an undercover investigation) they ask one simple question: ‘Touch my breast.’ OK, I’m out of the car. Done. And the case is over,”Case told the Alaska Dispatch News. “If we make that act (of touching) a misdemeanor, we have absolutely no way of getting involved in that type of arrest.”

Somehow, Case thinks it’s a necessary part of the job for officers to be able to abuse their power and force sex workers into compromising situation just to cover all of their bases. We couldn’t imagine this ever turning bad, could we?

Sadly, the pushback has stalled the movement of the bill and caused the sponsor of the bill, Anchorage Democrat and State Senator Berta Gardner, to take her foot off of the gas. There’s still hope that the law will do what is right.

“Now that the law enforcement community has stopped lying about the issue and there is more information on the table we expect lawmakers to act to prevent these sexual assaults,” Burns said. “Alaska has long held the shameful title of being the rape capital of the U.S. because of our rape statistics on the Uniform Crime Report, so preventing sexual assault is a strong priority here.”