12/9/07 Update on Lawrence v. Texas
See linked page - motion using Lawrence was dismissed by judge and 2 other losses using Lawrence case.

PALFREY IS USING A LAWRENCE Vs. TEXAS CONSTITUTIONAL DEFENSE!
Finally the case is being used!
I had e-mailed her attorney suggesting this and was thrilled to see that she is using this constitutional defense! She is using just as I have suggested in my discussion of the case at sexwork.com. I doubt if my suggestion was why its being used and I never received a response but it is being used!

If successful this could decriminalize private consenting adult prostitution in the U.S.  But it could be appealed up to the Supreme Court again where we now have Bush appointed judges who could go back to morality being a basis for law and we have no privacy rights as the Courts have held before.  But at least its getting a shot.

Highlights of motion to dismiss based prostitution laws being unconstitutional:

"Liberty protects the person from unwarranted government intrusions into a dwelling or
other private places. In our tradition the State is not omnipresent in the home. And there are
other spheres of our lives and existence, outside the home, where the States should not be a
dominant presence." And so begins the seminal decision in Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558,
562 (2003), in which the United States Supreme Court struck down the limited recognition of
privacy interests set forth some fifteen years earlier in Bowers v. Hardwick1 and invalidated a
Texas law criminalizing sexual conduct between consenting adults of the same sex. These same
constitutional considerations call for the dismissal of the charges brought against Deborah Jeane
Palfrey in this case.

The conduct in issue in this case occurred not on the public streets of the three
jurisdictions invoked by the United States, but, rather, occurred between consenting adults in
private homes, private hotel rooms, or other private areas. The conduct between these adults,
even assuming that the escorts breached their contractual agreement with Ms. Palfrey's business
and negotiated arrangements of sexual intercourse in exchange for compensation, occurred in
private settings and, therefore, occurred beyond the scope of what the government may properly
regulate. Accord Lawrence, 539 U.S. at 564 ("The petitioners were adults at the time of the
alleged offense. Their conduct was private and consensual.").

In Lawrence, the majority opinion does note that the conduct before it did not "involve
public conduct or prostitution." Lawrence, 539 at 578. But the context of that declaration was
the distinction between private interests and public interests. Consistent with Lawrence, Ms.
Palfrey does not challenge the aspect of the prostitution laws that apply to public conduct;
however, the allegedly proscribed conduct before this Court is purely private in nature and the
fact of a commercial component between the two consenting adults involved does not erode
those same privacy and liberty interests discussed in Lawrence."

Full motion at
http://deborahjeanepalfrey.com/download/Unconsitutional.pdf