An undercover effort involving police agencies from all along the Gulf Coast that targeted escort service and individuals listed on Craig’s List resulted in the arrest of 17 people.
Undercover operatives contacted services on the list. Police say that all those arrested agreed to sexual acts in exchange for money once they met undercover officers.
Two of those arrested are from the Jackson area and had been on the coast for two weeks. More arrests are anticipated as a result of this operation.
The agencies involved included D’Iberville Police, Biloxi Police, Gulfport Police, Ocean Springs Police, Jackson County Sheriff’s Department, Jackson County Narcotics Task Force and Harrison County Sheriff’s Office.
Prostitution has been around for centuries, but as law enforcement steps up efforts to get rid of the age-old sex trade, pimps and prostitutes are finding more sophisticated ways to cash-in.
It’s more than just the internet; they’re now involved in identity theft, robbery and drugs.
Earlier this month, News Channel 12 was invited to follow Hinds County Deputies as they busted a suspected prostitution house in Terry. During the sting, deputies confiscated $16,000 in cash, Valium, steroids and other drugs. The suspected pimp, 54-year-old James Little, is still on the loose. Deputies say he was running a motorcycle repair business as a front.
After decades of undercover stings, Major Nick Clark says prostitutes are turning to more unconventional methods, like the internet.
“They post their pictures, some of them are as explicit as anything I’ve ever seen,“ he said. “Advertising what they do, what they’re willing to do, how much they charge for it.“
Sting targets escort service prostitutes
By Margaret Baker
An undercover investigation targeting prostitutes at South Mississippi businesses providing escort services has resulted in the arrests of nine people, including three men who happened to be in the vicinity of the bust when they were arrested on a misdemeanor drug charge.
Harrison County Sheriff’s Department Lt. Troy Peterson said the undercover sting targeted employees of South Mississippi escort agencies, though he did not want to identify the agencies allegedly involved because of an ongoing investigation. Peterson said the undercover probe was conducted at an undisclosed location.
“We’ve gotten complaints in the past about local prostitution in different areas in Harrison County and decided we were going to target some of the companies,” Peterson said.
Undercover officers arrest 4 at strip clubs Three dancers face solicitation of prostitution charges
An undercover operation at a pair of Jackson strip clubs (Babes and Tiffany’s Cabaret) has led to the arrests of four people, including three dancers accused of offering sexual favors for money.
All three are charged with solicitation of prostitution, Hinds County Sheriff’s Department Chief Deputy Steve Pickett said. The arrests occurred, Pickett said, after the dancers agreed to have sex with undercover deputies in exchange for money.
A manager for the Babes club, however, disputes the accusation , “I was told that the undercover deputies were soliciting sex from all the girls but they all shot them down.”
“What happened was one girl gave one of the guys a fake number just to shut him up, and that’s when she was arrested. No price was ever negotiated.”
He said the club has a strict no-prostitution policy and the dancers know that.
“We run a very clean club,” he said. “We were told that they can’t give out any kind of phone number, even if it’s fake. So we plan to meet with our entertainers and bring them up to speed.”
States demand details from Craigslist on anti-prostitution screening
Attorneys general from seven states are asking online classified site Craigslist for details on how it will keep pornography and prostitution off its newly created adult services section.
Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal and others are making the request two weeks after Craigslist agreed to eliminate its “erotic services” ads. The Web site came under intense scrutiny after a Boston man was charged with killing a masseuse he met from Craigslist online classifieds.
Craigslist has not prescreened ads in the past, but says postings in its new adult services section are reviewed before being posted.
Blumenthal says attorneys general from Maryland, Missouri, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Mississippi and New Hampshire signed the request asking Craigslist for more detail on the screening process.
A Craigslist attorney did not immediately return a call.
The suits down at Craigslist can’t play stupid for much longer, as law enforcement continues to focus their attention on their ‘Erotic Services’ category. Read the whole story at The Charlotte Business Journal…
S.C. threatens Craigslist over ads
S.C. Attorney General Henry McMaster has written to Craigslist Chief Executive Jim Buckmaster, threatening “criminal investigation and prosecution” over personal ads on the site that McMaster claims are used for prostitution.
In November, Craigslist agreed to crack down on postings that advertised prostitution or “erotic services” as part of a set of changes endorsed by attorneys general in about 40 states.
At that time, the San Francisco business also sued 14 software and service providers, saying in part that they claim to offer help in evading Craigslist’s rules about illegal activity.
But McMaster is the latest in a string of state attorneys general to complain that Craigslist hasn’t done enough to clean up the ads.
In his letter to Buckmaster, McMaster says Craigslist “has not installed sufficient safeguards since November to prohibit the Internet site from being used as a vehicle to advertise or solicit prostitution.”
Attorneys general in Illinois, Missouri and Connecticut have also expressed concern about the issue.
Buckmaster wrote Tuesday on his company’s blog that “we see no legal basis whatsoever for filing a lawsuit” against Craigslist. He said he hoped to work with S.C. officials to address their concerns without violating “anyone’s constitutional rights.”
Craigslist has felt unfairly singled out on this issue for some time. Its blog has many entries stating its position and referring to media articles that agree with it.
In November, Buckmaster told the San Francisco Business Times, a sister publication of the Charlotte Business Journal, “We’re not looking to crack down in any sense on legal activity. Legal activity includes advertisements for escort services, massage services — the kind of ads we’ve seen for years in newspapers and Yellow Pages.”
Police discovered wads of cash and a booming business as they arrest nearly two dozen people in a prostitution sting. Police say one of the women hauled into custody had enough money on her to buy a car.
Wayne County Sheriff Warren Evans says 10 women and 11 men who hooked up for acts of prostitution, meeting at hotels and motels at Metro Airport and elsewhere in Wayne County, were arrested.
The arrests came in three days of stings targeting Craigslist, the free marketplace on the Internet where the women advertised as escorts and companions, only to charge up to $175 to $200 an hour as prostitutes.
Investigators say one woman was caught with $16,000 in her hotel room.
The prostitutes’ 11 customers were all from metro Detroit, but the women – aged 20 to 38 — were from Las Vegas and Missouri as well as Detroit and suburban Detroit.
A good-sized prostitution ring has been busted in Springfield, Illinois. STL Today reports…
Woman, 61, accused of role in prostitution ring
Court documents show a 61-year-old woman from a small central Illinois village played a key role in an alleged multistate prostitution ring.
Letha Deanna Dean of Pleasant Plains and 16 other adults were charged Wednesday by a federal grand jury with conspiracy and coercion. The Springfield State Journal-Register reported today on Dean’s involvement in every one of the 19 phone calls among defendants outlined in the indictment.
The indictment says the prostitution operation ran out of a home in Springfield, about 15 miles from Pleasant Plains.
The indictment describes phone conversations about prostitutes’ attributes, fees and travel arrangements between Dean and people in Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Missouri, Alabama, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and Florida.
A telephone listing for Dean in Pleasant Plains was disconnected today. It was unclear whether she has hired an attorney.
A report on some jurisdictions publicizing the identities of arrested clients. USA Today reports…
To reduce prostitution, cities try shaming clients
By Jordan Schrader, USA TODAY
Tired of arresting and re-arresting prostitutes, police in communities across the nation are increasingly targeting their clients with an old technique — shame.
A two-year study for the U.S. Justice Department’s National Institute of Justice, led by researcher Michael Shively and released in March, found more than 200 communities nationwide have tried targeting customers of prostitution in print, on TV, the Internet, billboards or by sending “Dear john” letters home.
Shively, of the social science research company Abt Associates in Cambridge, Mass., has continued to track efforts and said his list now includes about 280 examples. He said use of these techniques appears to be increasing.
Chicago, New York, Denver, St. Louis and Madison, Wis., are among the cities that publicize arrests or send letters home, a USA TODAY review of policies showed.
University of Wisconsin Law School professor Michael Scott said police turn to humiliation as a low-cost strategy, but it doesn’t deter prostitutes. Scott said it’s more effective at scaring away customers, but then new clients replace them.
“The potential population of clients is too large, so there’s always a steady stream of new clients,” Scott said.
Among the latest programs:
New Haven, Conn., police kicked off a prostitution crackdown Aug. 14 in the Fair Haven neighborhood with 12 arrests of clients whose names and photos were released to news media, city spokeswoman Jessica Mayorga said. News outlets including WTNH-TV, WVIT-TV and the New Haven Register used them.
Elgin, Ill., on July 23 approved releasing the names of clients to news media, spokeswoman Ann Dinges said.
Warren, Mich., this month started posting online pictures of people arrested as prostitutes and customers, and it expects to expand to the city TV station, Police Commissioner William Dwyer said.
Asheville, N.C., police began showcasing arrested prostitutes and their clients on the city’s website and television channel in February, according to Officer Steve Riddle. The move has drawn criticism from the American Civil Liberties Union.
“Our argument is, it’s punishment prior to conviction,” said Katy Parker, legal director for the ACLU of North Carolina.
Asheville police also send “Suspicious Activity Notice” postcards to owners of cars spotted possibly cruising for prostitutes, Riddle said.
Law enforcement agencies reported 59,724 prostitution arrests to the FBI in 2006, according to the agency’s most recent “Crime in the United States” report. While that number was down from 62,663 in 2005, municipalities continue to seek ways to discourage the crime.
Shively says there has been no comprehensive research into whether shaming strategies actually deter crime.
Denver’s Johns TV seems to have contributed to a decline in prostitution, police Lt. Mark Fleece said. Show producer David DiManna said he has recognized repeat offenders while reading names over the air. The show runs twice daily on city-owned Denver 8 TV.
Indianapolis brings clients together several times a year with residents of the neighborhood they trolled. Since 1999, convicts have listened to stories of children unable to play on sidewalks littered with used needles and condoms, said Diane Hannell, the Marion County, Ind., community prosecution administrator.
Hannell said just 2% of graduates of the Red Zone program have been arrested again after nine years. Over that time, nearly 400 clients have spent eight Saturday hours listening to residents and picking up trash, she said.
“There is great pride in this neighborhood, and some of the older ladies just really let these guys have it,” said Jay Height, a pastor who helped found the program.
Sometimes the strategies don’t last. In Kansas City, Mo., in the 1990s, police had to vet names before each TV airing for plea deals that might have sealed the charges. That was too time-consuming, Capt. Rich Lockhart said.
