## Facts

- Debbie Plas was charged with soliciting for the purpose of prostitution under AS 11.40.230.
- Plas moved to dismiss, arguing Alaska’s prostitution laws violated equal protection because prostitution was defined only in terms of female conduct.
- The district court dismissed the criminal charge; the State did not appeal, but continued enforcing the statutes.
- Plas then filed a civil action seeking declaratory and injunctive relief invalidating Alaska’s prostitution-related statutes; the State moved to dismiss for lack of standing.
- Dorothy Farrell and Jean Ross were separately charged under the same statutory scheme and sought appellate review on the same constitutional theory.
- The Alaska Supreme Court consolidated Plas’s criminal appeal and civil action with Farrell and Ross’s petition for review.
- The challenged definition statute provided that prostitution includes “the giving or receiving of the body by a female for sexual intercourse for hire” (AS 11.40.210), which informed enforcement of the solicitation provision (AS 11.40.230).

## Issues

1. Whether Plas had standing to seek declaratory and injunctive relief challenging prostitution-related statutes after her prior charge was dismissed.
2. Whether defining prostitution solely in terms of female conduct violates equal protection under the Alaska Constitution and the Fourteenth Amendment.
3. If unconstitutional as written, whether the appropriate remedy is invalidation of the statutory scheme or a limiting construction that removes the sex-based classification.

## Decision

- The court held Plas had standing because she alleged a concrete, continuing threat of enforcement and resulting economic and emotional injury.
- The court held the prostitution statutory scheme was unconstitutional to the extent it limited criminal liability to females.
- The court remedied the constitutional defect by construing the statutes in a gender-neutral manner, extending their coverage to males as well as females rather than striking the laws in full.
- As construed, prosecutions under the prostitution and solicitation provisions must proceed without sex-based distinctions.

## Legal Principles

- Standing for declaratory or injunctive relief is satisfied where ongoing enforcement creates a genuine threat of imminent injury and sufficient adversity of interests, even if a prior prosecution was dismissed.
- A law that distinguishes between criminal and non-criminal conduct on the basis of sex violates equal protection absent an adequate justification tied to a legitimate governmental objective.
- Historical association or sex-based stereotypes do not justify imposing criminal liability on one sex while exempting the other for equivalent conduct.
- When a statute contains an unconstitutional sex-based classification, courts may, if consistent with legislative intent, cure the defect through severability and gender-neutral construction rather than total invalidation.

## Conclusion

The Alaska Supreme Court ruled that a prostitution definition limited to “a female” denied equal protection, recognized standing to obtain declaratory relief against ongoing enforcement, and preserved the legislature’s regulation of prostitution by interpreting the statutes to apply to all persons regardless of sex.


Plas v. State, 598 P.2d 966 (Alaska 1979)