Court Opinion

ID: 9724245
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 10:49:39.809282+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:58.303661
License: Public Domain

Robert W. Hansen, J.
(concurring). In construing Wisconsin laws the applicable statute requires that as to references to gender: “Words importing one gender extend and may be applied to any gender.” (Sec. 990.-001 (2), Stats.) Applying this legislatively mandated rule of construction, the writer would hold the reference in sec. 944.30 to “Any female who intentionally does any of the following . . .” to extend and to be applied to persons of the male gender as well as to persons of the female gender. It follows that any person, male or female, who “. . . [h]as or offers to have nonmarital sexual intercourse for any thing of value . . .” commits a crime under sec. 944.30 (1). The challenge to the statute, based on an assumed failure to criminalize male, as well as female, prostitution, fails, ab initio, because both male and female prostitutes are included, not excluded in the reach of the statute. Under sec. 944.30 what is wrong for the goose is also wrong for the gander. For this reason and under this construction of the statute, the writer would concur that the judgment appealed from be affirmed.