Read more at KFOR.com…

Hookers busted in online sting
by Bobbie Miller

A prostitution ring is busted after police found their criminals on a popular classified ads website. They say with just a few clicks of the mouse and an e-mail, you can easily set-up an appointment with a prostitute in your area.

19-years-old and in the Midwest City Jail for the third time, one young woman keeps getting arrested for prostitution. She started selling her body for sex after she found out about Backpage.com.

Officers found out about it last week and found many of these illegal transactions were taking place in hotels along I-40 and Sooner Road. In a one-night sting, they arrested her and 5 others and the man police say is their pimp.

Police Chief Brandon Clabes said, “Prostitution used to be a seedy side lifestyle, but now it’s wide open on the web. You can do what you want & we want to send a message that we don’t want prostitution in Midwest City.”

Read the whole story at KnoxNews…

Arrests, citations have little effect on prostitution problem

Some streetwalkers may be arrested dozens of times during the course of their careers, but they rarely spend more than a few hours or days behind bars at a time, court records show.

In fact, they are often issued a citation in lieu of arrest, and some even make bond in time to be arrested again the next day.

“It’s just the price of doing business,” said Kevin Teeters, a prosecutor with the Knox County District Attorney General’s Office. “It just doesn’t mean anything to them.”

Under Tennessee law, buying or selling sex is a Class B misdemeanor punishable by a maximum of six months behind bars with no mandatory fine, Teeters said. If it takes place near a church or school, it becomes a Class A misdemeanor that carries 11 months and 29 days in jail with a seven-day minimum sentence and a $1,000 fine.

Most cases, however, are pleaded to a lesser offense and unsupervised probation in lieu of jail, Teeters said.

Over the past five years, at least 782 people have been arrested or cited for more than 1,700 prostitution-related charges that have passed through Knox County General Sessions Court, according to court records.

Many offenders get charged only once or twice before dropping off the system’s radar. Others become permanent fixtures in local courtrooms, records show.

Knoxville’s 11 most cited or arrested prostitutes – with at least 10 tickets or arrests since 2004 – have racked up 459 criminal charges over their lifetimes.

Read the whole story at The Niagara Falls Review…

Ferry Street hookers have merchants upset
Posted By COREY LAROCQUE

Hookers in Niagara Falls and their customers might become video stars if the city brings in cameras in a bid to scare them away.

Surveillance cameras are one option to be explored by city staff to discourage the world’s oldest profession on a stretch of Ferry Street.

Coun. Vince Kerrio said business owners have recently complained the stretch between Stanley Avenue and Main Street has become overrun with prostitutes.

Their customers are “intimidated” by women walking the street selling sex, Kerrio said.

“This is a problem today. These business owners say their customers are complaining,” Kerrio said during Monday’s council meeting. “It’s just disgusting. I can see people being very intimidated by that.”

“They’re there all the time … It’s a problem for everybody,” said one owner, who asked not to be identified in the paper.

They’re bold enough to approach his customers, he added.

Patrol by bike cops might discourage the hookers.

An officer driving through the area in a cruiser isn’t enough of a deterrent, though, because the women disappear when they see a police car, then reappear minutes later, the businessman said.

Kerrio said he sympathizes with business operators struggling to make a living but who are reluctant complain about the prostitutes. The women are aggressive and they might be working for pimps.

…

Surveillance cameras would be an effective deterrent because both prostitutes and their customers would be embarrassed by the prospect of getting caught on tape, said Coun. Wayne Thomson.

When Thomson was mayor in the 1980s, prostitution plagued the downtown area. Then someone stood on the street with a video camera filming vehicles driving in the area. They took licence plate numbers, and letters were sent to the owners.

“I can tell you, that’s going to resolve the problem,” Thomson said.

In Toronto, surveillance cameras have been used both as deterrents and for collecting evidence. Last fall, the Toronto Sun reported there were 700 cameras installed at city-owned buildings in addition to 11,000 the Toronto Transit Commission was installing on buses and subways and TTC stops.

Niagara Regional Police are going to look at the situation in light of council’s concerns. That might include an increased police presence in the area, sweeps or other investigative techniques, said Staff Sgt. George McCabe, who leads the NRP’s intelligence unit in Niagara Falls.

Read the whole story at The Seattle Times…

Looking for a prostitute? Bill would allow police to seize your car
The Legislature is debating bills that would allow police to impound the cars of people arrested on prostitution-related charges.
By Jennifer Sullivan

Communities across the state may soon see new signs popping up along busy highways and streets — a warning that the car of anyone arrested on prostitution-related charges could be seized by police.

The state Legislature is debating yet another proposal that would allow police to impound vehicles in prostitution cases. A bill last year called for seizing such cars and selling them to help fund police operations. It failed in the House.

This year, two identical bills in the House and Senate call for impounding the cars of people arrested in connection with soliciting, patronizing or promoting prostitution within neighborhoods designated as prostitution-heavy zones. Cities would map out these zones and post warning signs before the impoundments could begin.

The cars, however, would be returned to their owners once towing and impound fees were paid. Those acquitted of the charges would get their fees refunded.

Under current law, people with a previous conviction for patronizing prostitution or commercial sexual abuse of a minor could see their vehicles impounded if arrested in a new prostitution-related crime.

The proposed law would expand the crimes that would qualify for a vehicle impound. It also would add a provision stating that cars of suspects with no previous conviction could be impounded in the event of arrests within a designated prostitution zone.

A pimp reports a creepy client to The Po-Po.  The East Valley Tribune reports…

Pimp tips cops to man trying to buy child sex

Phoenix police say a pimp outraged by a man’s efforts to find a 10-year-old girl for sex led to an investigation that ended with the man’s arrest.

The man was arrested by immigration agents on Christmas Eve at the San Francisco airport after returning from a Mexican vacation. Police spokesman Sgt. Andy Hill said Monday that the 35-year-old is awaiting extradition on an attempted child prostitution charge.

Hill says an enraged pimp reported the would-be client’s alleged attempt to secure a child prostitute last summer.

Police and the FBI became involved, and Hill says the man offered an undercover officer $1,500 for sex with her and a 10-year-old girl.

A routine bust of street walkers turns into a gunshot display. Read the whole story at TampaBay.com…

Police: suspect in prostitution sting fires round

A Tampa man was under arrest this morning after he fired a gun during a prostitution sting, according to police. No one was hurt.

The man was arrested and charged with carrying a concealed weapon and felony possession of a firearm, according to police.

Just before 1 a.m., officers from the Tampa Police Department’s street anti-crime unit on patrol on Nebraska Avenue picked up two women who had previously been convicted on prostitution charges, according to an incident report.

The report said the officers, “attempting to make another case” on the women, brought them to an address and dropped one of the women off. She entered an duplex apartment building there. According to an arrest report, the man lives at the address.

When the officers pulled away in their unmarked car, they heard a single gunshot. The gunman ran behind the duplex and discarded the firearm there, police said. It was unclear where or how the gun was fired.

Portland police bust 150 people for prostitution related offenses in the last two months.  Read the whole story at The Oregonian…

Portland police nab nearly 150 in prostitution sting
by Joseph Rose

Portland police have arrested 88 prostitutes and 56 johns as part of an ongoing sex-trade sting along 82nd Avenue since mid-August, officials said today.

Officers from East, Southeast and Northeast precincts also arrested a person for promoting prostitution. Three of those arrested were juveniles, police said.

Since the missions began on Aug. 13, the three precincts have staffed a patrol unit focusing on reducing prostitution and related crime on 82nd Avenue.

Some increased cooperation between law enforcement and the ladies working the streets. The Boston Globe reports…

A young prostitute dials 911, and police make an arrest

The streetwalkers and the detectives: It’s not the latest TV reality show. Instead, it’s a growing reality in these parts – cooperation between prostitutes and the police.

In Brockton, a group of streetwalkers aided the cops in their June arrest of a 35-year-old software company employee charged with raping four prostitutes. Hookers in that same city also helped police in August bust Boston deputy fire chief Peter Pearson, 51, who is also charged with raping prostitutes. He resigned earlier this month.

In one of the most recent examples, a 17-year-old prostitute led Boston police to a hulking New York parolee named Michael A. Smith, 34, who was arraigned Sept. 9 in Suffolk Superior Court on a charge of kidnapping the girl.

According to a police report, the teenager was a runaway who was working as a prostitute downtown and in Dorchester. In June, she tried an online come-on, and Smith allegedly answered.

Prosecutors say Smith took her to New York and put her to work there on the street. She told police that he slapped her around to keep her obedient. He made her call him “Daddy.” After she tried to flee once, police say, Smith threw her into a car and said he was going to kill her. As the car motored north back to Boston, authorities say, Smith drove home his point by choking her and smacking her face with a cellphone. When the car slowed down in Oak Square, Brighton, the teenager darted out. This time she got away. She dialed 911.

“We know now that the vast majority of girls and teens involved in the sex trade are forced into it by others,” Suffolk District Attorney Daniel Conley said in a statement. “Our goals now are to help these girls and hold those pimps accountable.”

An update on that discovery of prositution run out of a New Jersey veterinarian’s office.  The Daily Record reports…

Novartis worker indicted in Internet prostitution

BEDMINSTER (GNJ)– A Hackettstown man has been indicted by a Somerset County grand jury on charges of promoting prostitution on the Internet.

David. C. Baker, 35, has been indicted on charges of promoting prostitution and conspiracy.

The investigation, dubbed Operation Net-Vet Harlot, began when Bedminster police Detective Craig Meyer was monitoring the Internet for criminal activity and found an ad on craigslist.org for “erotic services,” said Somerset County Prosecutor Wayne J. Forrest. That led to Meyer meeting Cathy Rosania, 50, of Lebanon Township, at a veterinary facility in the Pluckemin section of Bedminster, where she was an assistant.

An investigation revealed Meyer had actually been communicating with Baker, who was posing as a prostitute, Forrest said.

Further investigation found that Baker was serving as her pimp, screening clients on the computer, sometimes at his place of work, Novartis in East Hanover, Forrest said.

Looks like LE is keeping busy in the streets of AC.  Press of Atlantic City reports…

35 nabbed in latest Atlantic City prostitution sting
By ERIC SCOTT CAMPBELL

ATLANTIC CITY – Three weeks after arresting 29 people on prostitution charges on Pacific Avenue, police returned to the street for five hours Saturday and pulled in 24 would-be clients.

Both stings were conducted on early Saturday mornings. Complaints from residents and businesses prompted the operations, Capt. Glenn Abrams said.

Saturday’s sting involved 20 to 25 officers, Abrams said, including four women who posed as prostitutes. Two of those had participated in similar operations before.

Besides the 24 people arrested on charges of soliciting the purported prostitutes – one of whom offered to pay in cocaine – three men were charged with promoting prostitution. One had his car seized. Five women solicited by an undercover officer were arrested on charges of engaging in prostitution. Three people in the area were arrested for unrelated offenses.

With 35 people in holding cells requiring administrative attention, the sting ended.

“We could’ve kept going and arrested more, but they’re out there for five hours,” Abrams added, referring to the officers posing as prostitutes.

Police were more specific than three weeks ago about where the arrests were taking place. Abrams described the stretch as between Albany and Missouri avenues. The previous sting was pegged between the northernmost casino, the Showboat Casino-Hotel, and the southernmost, the Atlantic City Hilton Casino Resort.

It was not known whether any of those arrested have faced prostitution charges before. Eight are resort residents, and another 12 live elsewhere in southern New Jersey.