By Peter Berton

HONOLULU – Undercover police officers in Hawaii are authorized to have sex with prostitutes as part of investigations — and they’re fighting state lawmakers to keep their legal exemption on the books.

Hawaii’s legislators are examining and revamping the state’s prostitution laws. To say they’re not happy that taxpayers fund official mattress romps would be an understatement. Honolulu police counter that the exemption in the law allows undercover officers to obtain incontrovertible evidence by behaving exactly as any other john would behave.

Although police won’t reveal exactly how often they covertly take advantage of the world’s oldest profession, they maintain the exemption is vital to uncovering vice and corruption in paradise.

“The procedures and conduct of the undercover officers are regulated by department rules, which by nature have to be confidential,” Honolulu Police Maj. Jerry Inouye told the state’s House Judiciary Committee. “If prostitution suspects, pimps and other people are privy to that information, they’re going to know exactly how far the undercover officer can and cannot go.”

Hawaii’s law enforcement officers successfully blocked a change to the law earlier this year, but lawmakers haven’t given up their crusade. Officials from other agencies are a bit nonplussed by the whole affair.

“I don’t know of any state or federal law that allows any law enforcement officer undercover to … do what this law is allowing,” Roger Young, a retired FBI agent who worked sex crimes in Las Vegas, told the Associated Press. “Once we agree on the price and the sex act, that’s all that you need. [Agreeing on a price] breaks the law.”

According to Derek Marsh, a human-trafficking expert who trains California police officers to handle prostitution busts, having sex with prostitutes “doesn’t help [an officer’s] case, and at worst you further traumatize someone. And do you think he or she [the prostitute] is going to trust a cop again?”

Charlie Fuller, executive director of the International Association of Undercover Officers, reportedly laughed when asked about the Hawaii exemption.

“A good undercover [cop] is going to get probable cause before they have to cross that line,” he told the AP.