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http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/hea ... 54536.htmlVirginia sheriff defends practice, saying the contact is necessary to win convictions
By TOM JACKMAN
Washington Post
They enter the massage parlors as undercover detectives. They leave as satisfied customers.
In Spotsylvania County, Va., as part of a campaign by the sheriff's office to root out prostitution in the massage parlor business, detectives have been receiving sexual services from "masseuses." During several visits to an establishment called Moon Spa last month, detectives allowed women to perform sexual acts on them on four occasions and once left a $350 tip, according to court papers.
Spotsylvania Sheriff Howard Smith said the practice is not new and that only unmarried detectives are assigned to such cases. Most prostitutes are careful not to say anything incriminating, so sexual contact is necessary, he said.
"If I thought we could get the conviction without that, we wouldn't allow it," Smith said. "If you want to make 'em, this has to be done."
But numerous police and legal experts said they were not aware of other law enforcement agencies in the country allowing sexual contact in prostitution investigations.
"It's insane," said Charles Key Sr., a retired Baltimore police lieutenant who trains police officers and federal agents across the country. "If you allow officers to go through with the act, they've violated the law. You don't get an exception for participating in a violation of law."
Harry "Hap" Connors, chairman of the Spotsylvania Board of Supervisors, was not aware county investigators were having sexual contact with suspects.
Typically, a verbal agreement to provide services, plus an overt act such as undressing or producing a condom, will support a charge of soliciting prostitution, according to prosecutors, defense attorneys, police officials and law professors.
Key and others said undercover officers need only obtain an offer of sex-for-money to make a case.
Jon Gould, a criminal law professor at George Mason University, said, "I've never heard of that anywhere else in any police department. You don't have to go through with the act to prove (solicitation)." He said it is an improper use of taxpayer dollars.
Smith and Spotsylvania Assistant Commonwealth's Attorney Thomas Shaia likened the situation to investigators buying drugs from a drug dealer. But police officials and prosecutors in many jurisdictions said buying drugs is not analogous; officers purchase drugs for evidence, but don't use them.
Smith said his department's approach was not a secret, since detectives had testified to similar experiences in trials of other massage parlor operators.
Spotsylvania sheriff's deputies have shut down several massage parlors with the help of the Virginia attorney general's office, specifically its Financial Crime Intelligence Center. The director of the center, Edward Doyle, authored the affidavit for the raid last week on Moon Spa, which resulted in the arrests of the spa's alleged proprietors.
