I just read an article on nytimes about sting operations to arrest 'johns' Link to articl (Reg Reqd)
whats the point really? are they really hurting anyone by paying for sex? Especially since its consensual?
article below, for the lazy...
THEY could be students in a classroom anywhere. The pupils sit in rows of chairs with fold-out desktops, taking and passing notes, eyeing wristwatches and cellphones. They laugh despite themselves when a classmate misreads the text aloud, substituting "pubic area" for "public area." They tap their feet impatiently and pass around packs of gum. Sometimes a tiny detail betrays them: a dull gleam of gunmetal at the hip, or a spoken reference to time on the 24-hour clock.
"If he were to say, 'I'm a Goodyear auto mechanic, and I'll fix your car in exchange for whatever sexual act,' I'd say yes," lectures Detective Jeffrey Etheridge, one of the instructors. As the giggling dies down, he adds, "This is more for academic discussion. This is never going to happen out on the street."
Call them the newest recruits for the oldest profession. The students - over a hundred of them, many female in their mid-20's - are all New York police officers who have volunteered to walk, or even strut, to the rhythm of an unusual beat. Hailing from precincts across the city, they've convened for a common purpose: to learn the tricks of the prostitute's trade and go undercover in a citywide sting called Operation Losing Proposition.
Their education is a single seven-hour session, traditionally offered twice or three times annually at the Police Academy on East 20th Street. The program began about a decade ago, and after a year's hiatus because of personnel and budget concerns, a pair of classes were taught late last year, preparing more than 200 new officers to walk the streets.
Some will tackle neighborhoods with the busiest corners in town, rough-and-tumble places like Hunts Point in the Bronx or Queens Plaza; the intersection of Weehawken and Christopher Streets in the West Village, popular among transvestites; or a notorious industrial strip in East New York, Brooklyn, between Flatlands Avenue and Linden Boulevard, that the police call the Pennsylvania Track.
But even in the busiest areas, busting a bona fide john is no easy task.
"You're going to get some very unusual requests: kissing, hugging, talking, medical procedures," Detective James Held of the Vice Division told his November class, adding that none of those requests was a crime. He offered an example: "What if someone comes up to you and says: 'Do you know what I want you to do? I want you to dress up like a girl and I want to go back to a hotel room, and I want you to paint my toenails. I'll pay you a thousand dollars for the hour.' "
"I'll bring the nail polish!" called out Tisjé Golden, an officer from the 25th Precinct in East Harlem. Laughter rippled outward from her seat and spread though the audience.
Still, Detective Held clarified, that's not a crime. Prostitution is not like a game of horseshoes. Close isn't good enough. To determine whether a suspect's behavior is illegal, officers must consult a rigorous recipe. The first ingredient is a sexual act, whether promised or performed. The latter, joked Detective Etheridge, who works in the Police Department's legal bureau, "is something you're not going to worry about, because you're not going to have sex, at least not on company time."
The second component is money, goods or services, including anything from a vial of crack to a ride across town. The final touch is an agreement, verbal or otherwise (a simple nod of the head will do, the courts have concluded), to bind the service and fee together in a consensual exchange. To gather these elements, an experienced decoy will choreograph a suggestive verbal ballet, getting a john to articulate what he wants without being too pushy. Any aggressive or overly eager behavior, like offering repeated discounts or chasing down a customer, can be dismissed as entrapment.
Patronizing a prostitute is a Class B misdemeanor, punishable by up to three months in prison and a fine not to exceed $500. In certain cases, the police may even seize a john's car.
"Remember, as police, our role is to detect crime, not create crime," Detective Held gently reminded his charges. As the students listened, some thumbed through copies of a 46-page handbook that included a brief glossary of the prostitute's vernacular, a kama sutra of sexual slang. The lexicon included phrases like "john jams," or "lines of cars with tricks/johns to be serviced." It also named different types of prostitutes, from the "lot lizard," whose habitat is a truck stop, to the "bubble gum prostitute," who will sell herself for anything, accepting drugs, alcohol, or cigarettes in lieu of cash.
The curriculum also included tactics and equipment. Conversations with customers are recorded using a remote audio system called a Kel set. Before hitting the streets, students learned, a decoy hitches up to a transmitter, roughly the size of a pack of cigarettes, and snakes a microphone wire up the inside of his or her shirt. Sgt. Dan Farrell, an equipment expert, cautioned his students against leaning into the window of a john's vehicle while wearing a wire. It's a sloppy move that not only makes decoys vulnerable to getting grabbed by the hair, but also threatens to expose the wire.
Students learned how other officers play supporting roles, from the arrest team waiting nearby in unmarked cars, to the "ghost," an undercover officer who fades into the surroundings, ready to help a decoy in distress. Depending on the situation, a ghost may choose to pose as a pimp, a wino or a junkie.
ASSUMING a role in Operation Losing Proposition is strictly voluntary. That said, it is also equal-opportunity.
"The decoy officer may be male or female," Detective Held announced, eliciting a chorus of groans and protests from the roughly 20 men in the class. "Sorry, guys. I used to say that, too," he quipped, "and then I was up on 43rd Street, shaking what mama gave me."
Officer Gamaliel Torres, 32, a broad-shouldered, soft-spoken officer from the Homeless Outreach Unit, said he was ribbed by colleagues when they heard he had signed up for the class. "I got a little hazing for it," he admitted.
Officer Taralee Gugliociello, 30, a former preschool teacher from a family of male police officers, said she was excited to try on the prostitute's role. "I'll be doing something my brothers can't do," she announced proudly, then reddened a bit. "I don't think they'd want to see," she confided. "My brothers would be like, 'Put some clothes on.' "
Not everyone shares the officers' ready spirit. "Is this really what our police department should be doing?" said Norman Siegel, a prominent civil rights lawyer and the former executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union. "Look at the consensual nature of the crime, the fact that they're arresting the john - that's problematic in and of itself - and then seizing cars as a deterrent. It's disproportionate to the crime. History shows that it's very hard to deter this kind of activity."
Since the mid-1990's, precincts have conducted Operation Losing Proposition sporadically, usually in response to neighbors' complaints. Some complain more loudly than others. Detective Kevin Mannion, an instructor from the vice squad, told the class about an eccentric woman whose cruel habit - dumping a pot of scalding water from her window to disperse the prostitutes below - once misfired and splashed a cluster of undercover officers.
For the police, taking lumps is a part of getting into the act. "We're all actors or actresses in a way," mused Sgt. Joanne Riggs, who coordinates the training classes. "You've gotta be."
At the very least, undercover prostitution busts are more colorful than routine traffic stops.
"It breaks the monotony and it gives them great stories; cops love great stories," offered Eugene O'Donnell, an assistant professor of police studies at John Jay College of Criminal Justice. "What's a more bizarre way to make a living than standing out on a corner and talking to some guy in a limo?"
Toward the end of the class, Officer Golden offered her own take on getting into character. With a laugh and a slight shimmy, she suggested a sly motive. "Every woman," she said, "has a little prostitute in her."
Cliffnotes?
its a friggin new article, read the damn thing.
whats the point really? are they really hurting anyone by paying for sex? Especially since its consensual?
article below, for the lazy...
THEY could be students in a classroom anywhere. The pupils sit in rows of chairs with fold-out desktops, taking and passing notes, eyeing wristwatches and cellphones. They laugh despite themselves when a classmate misreads the text aloud, substituting "pubic area" for "public area." They tap their feet impatiently and pass around packs of gum. Sometimes a tiny detail betrays them: a dull gleam of gunmetal at the hip, or a spoken reference to time on the 24-hour clock.
"If he were to say, 'I'm a Goodyear auto mechanic, and I'll fix your car in exchange for whatever sexual act,' I'd say yes," lectures Detective Jeffrey Etheridge, one of the instructors. As the giggling dies down, he adds, "This is more for academic discussion. This is never going to happen out on the street."
Call them the newest recruits for the oldest profession. The students - over a hundred of them, many female in their mid-20's - are all New York police officers who have volunteered to walk, or even strut, to the rhythm of an unusual beat. Hailing from precincts across the city, they've convened for a common purpose: to learn the tricks of the prostitute's trade and go undercover in a citywide sting called Operation Losing Proposition.
Their education is a single seven-hour session, traditionally offered twice or three times annually at the Police Academy on East 20th Street. The program began about a decade ago, and after a year's hiatus because of personnel and budget concerns, a pair of classes were taught late last year, preparing more than 200 new officers to walk the streets.
Some will tackle neighborhoods with the busiest corners in town, rough-and-tumble places like Hunts Point in the Bronx or Queens Plaza; the intersection of Weehawken and Christopher Streets in the West Village, popular among transvestites; or a notorious industrial strip in East New York, Brooklyn, between Flatlands Avenue and Linden Boulevard, that the police call the Pennsylvania Track.
But even in the busiest areas, busting a bona fide john is no easy task.
"You're going to get some very unusual requests: kissing, hugging, talking, medical procedures," Detective James Held of the Vice Division told his November class, adding that none of those requests was a crime. He offered an example: "What if someone comes up to you and says: 'Do you know what I want you to do? I want you to dress up like a girl and I want to go back to a hotel room, and I want you to paint my toenails. I'll pay you a thousand dollars for the hour.' "
"I'll bring the nail polish!" called out Tisjé Golden, an officer from the 25th Precinct in East Harlem. Laughter rippled outward from her seat and spread though the audience.
Still, Detective Held clarified, that's not a crime. Prostitution is not like a game of horseshoes. Close isn't good enough. To determine whether a suspect's behavior is illegal, officers must consult a rigorous recipe. The first ingredient is a sexual act, whether promised or performed. The latter, joked Detective Etheridge, who works in the Police Department's legal bureau, "is something you're not going to worry about, because you're not going to have sex, at least not on company time."
The second component is money, goods or services, including anything from a vial of crack to a ride across town. The final touch is an agreement, verbal or otherwise (a simple nod of the head will do, the courts have concluded), to bind the service and fee together in a consensual exchange. To gather these elements, an experienced decoy will choreograph a suggestive verbal ballet, getting a john to articulate what he wants without being too pushy. Any aggressive or overly eager behavior, like offering repeated discounts or chasing down a customer, can be dismissed as entrapment.
Patronizing a prostitute is a Class B misdemeanor, punishable by up to three months in prison and a fine not to exceed $500. In certain cases, the police may even seize a john's car.
"Remember, as police, our role is to detect crime, not create crime," Detective Held gently reminded his charges. As the students listened, some thumbed through copies of a 46-page handbook that included a brief glossary of the prostitute's vernacular, a kama sutra of sexual slang. The lexicon included phrases like "john jams," or "lines of cars with tricks/johns to be serviced." It also named different types of prostitutes, from the "lot lizard," whose habitat is a truck stop, to the "bubble gum prostitute," who will sell herself for anything, accepting drugs, alcohol, or cigarettes in lieu of cash.
The curriculum also included tactics and equipment. Conversations with customers are recorded using a remote audio system called a Kel set. Before hitting the streets, students learned, a decoy hitches up to a transmitter, roughly the size of a pack of cigarettes, and snakes a microphone wire up the inside of his or her shirt. Sgt. Dan Farrell, an equipment expert, cautioned his students against leaning into the window of a john's vehicle while wearing a wire. It's a sloppy move that not only makes decoys vulnerable to getting grabbed by the hair, but also threatens to expose the wire.
Students learned how other officers play supporting roles, from the arrest team waiting nearby in unmarked cars, to the "ghost," an undercover officer who fades into the surroundings, ready to help a decoy in distress. Depending on the situation, a ghost may choose to pose as a pimp, a wino or a junkie.
ASSUMING a role in Operation Losing Proposition is strictly voluntary. That said, it is also equal-opportunity.
"The decoy officer may be male or female," Detective Held announced, eliciting a chorus of groans and protests from the roughly 20 men in the class. "Sorry, guys. I used to say that, too," he quipped, "and then I was up on 43rd Street, shaking what mama gave me."
Officer Gamaliel Torres, 32, a broad-shouldered, soft-spoken officer from the Homeless Outreach Unit, said he was ribbed by colleagues when they heard he had signed up for the class. "I got a little hazing for it," he admitted.
Officer Taralee Gugliociello, 30, a former preschool teacher from a family of male police officers, said she was excited to try on the prostitute's role. "I'll be doing something my brothers can't do," she announced proudly, then reddened a bit. "I don't think they'd want to see," she confided. "My brothers would be like, 'Put some clothes on.' "
Not everyone shares the officers' ready spirit. "Is this really what our police department should be doing?" said Norman Siegel, a prominent civil rights lawyer and the former executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union. "Look at the consensual nature of the crime, the fact that they're arresting the john - that's problematic in and of itself - and then seizing cars as a deterrent. It's disproportionate to the crime. History shows that it's very hard to deter this kind of activity."
Since the mid-1990's, precincts have conducted Operation Losing Proposition sporadically, usually in response to neighbors' complaints. Some complain more loudly than others. Detective Kevin Mannion, an instructor from the vice squad, told the class about an eccentric woman whose cruel habit - dumping a pot of scalding water from her window to disperse the prostitutes below - once misfired and splashed a cluster of undercover officers.
For the police, taking lumps is a part of getting into the act. "We're all actors or actresses in a way," mused Sgt. Joanne Riggs, who coordinates the training classes. "You've gotta be."
At the very least, undercover prostitution busts are more colorful than routine traffic stops.
"It breaks the monotony and it gives them great stories; cops love great stories," offered Eugene O'Donnell, an assistant professor of police studies at John Jay College of Criminal Justice. "What's a more bizarre way to make a living than standing out on a corner and talking to some guy in a limo?"
Toward the end of the class, Officer Golden offered her own take on getting into character. With a laugh and a slight shimmy, she suggested a sly motive. "Every woman," she said, "has a little prostitute in her."
Cliffnotes?
its a friggin new article, read the damn thing.