DENVER (KDVR) — A bipartisan group of lawmakers at the Capitol is coming together to protect the rights of an unlikely group. A bill that would protect sex workers from facing prostitution charges after having reported being sexually assaulted is advancing.

Tiara Kelley is a former sex worker. Before moving to Denver, Kelley remembers an instance where a man she was working with snapped and hurt her to the point of needing medical attention.

“It got very bloody on my behalf, I mean he whooped me pretty well. I lost hair and blood and teeth and all types of stuff,” she said.

Once she reported this incident, Kelley said that law enforcement questioned her instead of helping.

“What did you do to deserve to be in this situation? What were you doing in this person’s car? They never, one time, asked me about the event, a description of the guy who had just beat me up, they never asked me about a description of his car. They even convinced me not to file a police report because they said nothing would come of it,” Kelley recalled.

Colorado lawmakers do not want these workers to stay silent.

“There’s a lot of people that are afraid to come forward because they are afraid of the ramifications of the prostitution charge,” said state Rep. Brianna Titone, D-Jefferson County.

Titone along with Delta Republican state Rep. Matt Soper, who represents Delta and Mesa counties, presented the House bill that would remove the possibility of sex workers facing prostitution charges when they call for help.

“This bill helps to alleviate the concern because that are involved with sex work and being trafficked will know that that kind of assault and that kind of reporting is really going to help them to stand up to people who will try to do that to them,” Titone said.

The measure passed unanimously out of committee this week, it cleared its second vote in the House on Friday and is now set for one more vote in the House on Monday before heading over to the Senate.