Opinion ID: 2265911
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 10

Heading: the statutory provisions applying the tax to escort services are unconstitutionally vague

Text: ¶ 54 In order to be unconstitutionally vague, a statute must either (1) fail to give the person of ordinary intelligence a reasonable opportunity to know what is prohibited, so that he may act accordingly, [92] or (2) be written in a way that encourages arbitrary and discriminatory enforcement. [93] As the primary trigger for applying the Tax to escort services, the term escort is defined in the Tax in a way that fails to provide relatively clear guidelines regarding what conduct is subject to the Tax. Accordingly, we determine that the statutory provisions applying the Tax to escort services are unconstitutionally vague. ¶ 55 The escort services provisions of the Tax are vague for the reasons enunciated by the United States Supreme Court in City of Chicago v. Morales. In Morales, the Court held that an ordinance prohibiting loitering was unconstitutionally vague when the ordinance defined loitering as remain[ing] in any one place with no apparent purpose. [94] Reasoning that the City of Chicago could not conceivably have meant to criminalize each instance a citizen stands in public, [95] the Court concluded that the ordinance was impermissibly vague because it failed to adequately distinguish what loitering is covered by the ordinance and what is not. [96] ¶ 56 Like the loitering ordinance in Morales, the statutory provisions applying the Tax to escort services fail to provide a person of ordinary intelligence guidance as to what conduct will trigger the Tax and what conduct will not. The Tax defines an escort as anyone who accompanies another for compensated companionship. [97] Nowhere does the statute define an escort in terms of nudity. The statute also fails to define the term companionship. Therefore, according to the plain terms of the statute, individuals who are paid for providing care for the elderly as well as those who are paid as tour guides would fall within the definition of an escort, and any person or business who employs them would be subject to the Tax. ¶ 57 The legislature could not conceivably have intended that companions for the elderly and tour guides would be subject to the Sexually Explicit Business and Escort Services tax. Yet, like the ordinance struck down in Morales, the Tax fails to provide adequate information for a person of ordinary intelligence to distinguish between those types of compensated companionship that the legislature intended would trigger application of the Tax and those that it intended would not. This ambiguity also permits arbitrary enforcement by the Commission. Accordingly, we hold that the provisions of the statute applying the tax to escort services are unconstitutionally vague.