'D.C. Madam' case enthralls capital - Phone list creates tremors of scandal/Facts and fantasy of US sex scandal
'D.C. Madam' case enthralls capital - Phone list creates tremors of scandal
By William Neikirk
Copyright © 2007, Chicago Tribune
Published May 1, 2007
WASHINGTON -- "Miz Julia" sent tremors through the nation's capital Monday simply by threatening to call her "clients" to testify at her trial. Talk about real power.
But Miz Julia, otherwise known as Deborah Jeane Palfrey, is neither a politician nor a high government official involved in making war or policy. Nor is she a CIA undercover agent.
Instead, she says she merely ran a legal escort service in the nation's capital featuring massages and sexual fantasy. To the contrary, say U.S. government prosecutors. They have charged her with racketeering by allegedly running a prostitution ring, with women charging $300 an hour.
Now, those allegations have given Palfrey, 50, of Vallejo, Calif., a nickname other than Miz Julia. She's become widely known as the "D.C. Madam" who has brought Washington an old-fashioned sex scandal.
And she's angry. "I believe there is something very, very rotten at the core of my circumstances," she said Monday after a court hearing in which a federal judge agreed to appoint a new public defender for her.
When sex and politics combine in this uptight capital, they can achieve explosive results. They forced the resignations of Reps. Wilbur Mills of Arkansas and Robert Livingston of Louisiana and resulted in the House voting to impeach President Bill Clinton in the wake of his affair with Monica Lewinsky.
And that raises questions about how big this scandal will become. Another prominent name or two could turn it into a very large one.
Already edgy about war, terrorism and political upheaval, this city could be on the verge of sensational disclosures about some highly prominent figures -- or so Palfrey claims. She has given a list of clients' telephone numbers to ABC News, which plans to air a story about her on Friday, during a "sweeps" rating period.
High-level resignation
Her disclosure already has swept away one of the State Department's top officials -- Randall Tobias, 65, who was in charge of foreign aid programs. Tobias resigned abruptly last week but claimed he only received massages from Palfrey's workers and did not have sexual relations with them.
As he put it, he called "to have gals come over to the condo to give me a massage."
The Washington Post reported over the weekend that Palfrey's lawyer had been contacted by five lawyers asking whether their clients' names were on her list of as many as 15,000 telephone numbers.
Of course, this scandal could quickly fade if only "small fries" show up on the list in coming days. Stephen Hess, a political science scholar at the Brookings Institution, said, "In this world of Britney Spears and Paris Hilton, this sad, pathetic little scandal of Washington will hardly get above the fold [of newspapers]. This one can't last more than a day or so."
After her court appearance, Palfrey told reporters she was "genuinely sorry" for Tobias and his family but added that his admission that he used the service only for massages is "valuable exculpatory evidence" for her.
She said she wished he had come forward earlier. "Had he done so earlier, along with many, many others who have used my company's services throughout the years, I most likely would not be in my current predicament."
Palfrey said she turned over phone records to ABC News in hopes the network would come up with the names of clients whom she could call to testify about her service, which she contends is legal.
She said she hired college-educated women for her firm, Pamela Martin and Associates, to provide "legal, high-end erotic fantasy service" and a "refined way of life" to clients.
She asked reporters "to put aside the titillation of the who's who list at least in part and instead investigate the disturbing genesis, the confounding evolution and the equally alarming continuation of this matter."
She also said the government should prosecute those "who disobeyed my directives, their signed contracts, and participated in illegal behavior, be they a client or subcontractor."
Palfrey said the Internal Revenue Service seized her life's savings after allegations were made that she operated a prostitution business from 1993 through August 2006, when she shut down her operations and retired.
$500,000 in property seized
She has sued the government for the return of $500,000 in seized property, but a federal judge recently ruled that the criminal case against her must first be resolved.
At first, she said she thought of selling the phone records to help pay for her defense, but she changed her mind, saying "this option quickly was abandoned for fear the records would end up in the possession of an unscrupulous person or persons."
Palfrey said ABC News is under no obligation to assist her, except to help her discover the names of the clients.
"For me, this is a necessity, since the government has placed me in the untenable position whereby I do not have sufficient monies to undertake this extraordinarily expensive task on my own."
The attorney handling her civil case, Montgomery Blair Sibley, took umbrage when a reporter asked if Palfrey's tactics amounted to blackmail.
"I don't know why that's blackmail," he said. "I call that due process of law. We don't have any options left."
----------
wneikirk@tribune.com
- - -
Recurring frolic and misfortune
If power is the great aphrodisiac, then Washington is a natural habitat for sex scandals, and history provides its share of examples:
Rep. Wilbur Mills (D-Ark.)
Chairman of the powerful, tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee, was stopped by U.S. Park Police in his speeding Lincoln Continental in 1974, accompanied by Annabella Battistella. Both of them were intoxicated, and she ran from the car and jumped into the Tidal Basin. Battistella, 38, was a stripper known professionally as Fanne Fox, the "Argentine Firecracker." Though Mills, 65, won re-election that year, his career came crashing down after he appeared on the stage of Boston's Pilgrim Theater, a seedy nightspot, to get a kiss from Battistella. He later checked himself into a clinic for treatment of alcoholism and retired in 1976.
Rep. Wayne Hays, (D-Ohio)
The influential chairman of the House Administration Committee kept a woman on his office staff in the mid-1970s who claimed she was paid $14,000 a year in public money to be his mistress. Hays, then 65, at first disputed her contentions but later admitted a relationship with Elizabeth Ray, 33, who famously declared in 1976: "I can't type. I can't file. I can't even answer the phone."
President Bill Clinton
Clinton was impeached in 1998 on grounds of perjury and obstruction of justice after his affair with White House intern Monica Lewinsky became public and he was accused of trying to cover it up. In 1999, Clinton was acquitted by the Senate.
Rep. Henry Hyde (R-Ill.)
Hyde, 74, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee investigating Clinton, acknowledged in 1998 having had a five-year affair with Cherie Snodgrass in the 1960s when both of them were married. Hyde admitted the affair after an online magazine, Salon, told Hyde's office it was publishing a story about Hyde and the beauty stylist. Hyde, who had the affair while he was in his 40s, said "the statute of limitations has long since passed on my youthful indiscretions."
Rep. Bob Livingston (R-La.)
Livingston was the presumptive speaker-elect of the House and was among Republicans calling for the ouster of Clinton in 1998. Ironically, it was Livingston who resigned amid allegations of his marital infidelity.
-- Tribune staff and news services
Facts and fantasy of US sex scandal
By Alex Barker in Washington
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Published: May 4 2007 03:00 | Last updated: May 4 2007 03:00
A sex scandal that has titillated Washington gossips and led to the resignation of a senior government official seems to be moving towards a denouement today, when a television programme opens up the workings of an escort service used by members of the political establishment.
Fighting charges of running prostitutes in the US capital, Deborah Jeane Palfrey, the "DC Madam" or "Beltway Bawd", has threatened to call prominent former clients to testify that her business was a legal "sexual fantasy service".
The prospect has thrown the press into turmoil, prompting commentary on issues ranging from Ms Palfrey's stock portfolio to her red lipstick and four-inch heels.
Last week, in a development that shocked Washington and gave some credence to her threats, Randall Tobias, the deputy secretary of state in charge of foreign aid, resigned after being forced to admit he used Ms Palfrey's service. Mr Tobias had been in charge of enforcing US policy that required recipients of Aids-related funding to condemn prostitution.
Mr Tobias was caught out by 20kgs of phone bills kept by Ms Palfrey. These record the calls she made since 1993 to thousands of clients and the 130 or more women who worked for her. After offering the records to the highest bidder, she eventually gave four years of the files to ABC news last month to identify prominent men.
The results of the investigation - which included spotting Mr Tobias's number - will be aired on ABC tonight. The network says the logs include calls from and to "a Bush administration economist, the head of a conservative think-tank, a prominent CEO, several lobbyists and a handful of military officials". It has not confirmed whether these people will be named.
The candid approach puts Ms Palfrey apart from infamous American madams, such as the "Hollywood Madam" Heidi Fleiss and the "Mayflower Madam" Sydney Biddle Barrows, who are known as much for the secrets they kept as the ones they told.
Explaining her response, Montgomery Sibley, Ms Palfrey's lawyer, told the Financial Times that both he and his client had served time in prison, giving them the "strength to look a bully in the eye and kick him in the nuts".
Whatever comes of the peek into the Ms Palfrey's big black book this evening, it will at least set limits to the hitherto unchecked speculation fuelled by the defendant and her lawyer.
Ms Palfrey has claimed "the tentacles of this matter reach far, wide and high into the echelons of power in the US". By contrast, journalists at ABC only think theinvestigation warrants one segment in an hour-longtelevision programme.
Yet, even if the disclosures prove to be a disappointment, the scandal may rumble on. "What people don't appreciate is that the four years given to ABC were the slow years of a declining business," said Mr Sibley.
Whereas those records include 10 to 15 prominent clients, he said, the "go-go years of the dotcom boom and Clinton administration" could include up to 35 more noteworthy names.
Ms Palfrey and Mr Sibley have yet to decide what to do with those documents. But Mr Sibley assured the FT that if he "did not appear on a regular basis" he had made arrangements for the records to be published online "for the whole world to see".
The pair have already published a sample page of the records on Ms Palfrey's website. But this simply highlights how difficult any investigation into Ms Palfrey's claims would be.
The 10-year-old document records calls to disconnected lines, the lobby of an apartment building, and the customer services of an electricity provider.
Background
Deborah Jeane Palfrey was nicknamed the "DC Madam" after being charged with running prostitutes in Washington. She claims her business was a legal escort service and wants to call former prominent clients to testify to that effect. She gave four years of her phone records to ABC news and the network is reporting on its investigation tonight.
Randall Tobias, the deputy secretary of state, resigned last week after ABC told him his number was on Ms Palfrey's phone logs. The network says it has found numbers for a number of other prominent figures.
By William Neikirk
Copyright © 2007, Chicago Tribune
Published May 1, 2007
WASHINGTON -- "Miz Julia" sent tremors through the nation's capital Monday simply by threatening to call her "clients" to testify at her trial. Talk about real power.
But Miz Julia, otherwise known as Deborah Jeane Palfrey, is neither a politician nor a high government official involved in making war or policy. Nor is she a CIA undercover agent.
Instead, she says she merely ran a legal escort service in the nation's capital featuring massages and sexual fantasy. To the contrary, say U.S. government prosecutors. They have charged her with racketeering by allegedly running a prostitution ring, with women charging $300 an hour.
Now, those allegations have given Palfrey, 50, of Vallejo, Calif., a nickname other than Miz Julia. She's become widely known as the "D.C. Madam" who has brought Washington an old-fashioned sex scandal.
And she's angry. "I believe there is something very, very rotten at the core of my circumstances," she said Monday after a court hearing in which a federal judge agreed to appoint a new public defender for her.
When sex and politics combine in this uptight capital, they can achieve explosive results. They forced the resignations of Reps. Wilbur Mills of Arkansas and Robert Livingston of Louisiana and resulted in the House voting to impeach President Bill Clinton in the wake of his affair with Monica Lewinsky.
And that raises questions about how big this scandal will become. Another prominent name or two could turn it into a very large one.
Already edgy about war, terrorism and political upheaval, this city could be on the verge of sensational disclosures about some highly prominent figures -- or so Palfrey claims. She has given a list of clients' telephone numbers to ABC News, which plans to air a story about her on Friday, during a "sweeps" rating period.
High-level resignation
Her disclosure already has swept away one of the State Department's top officials -- Randall Tobias, 65, who was in charge of foreign aid programs. Tobias resigned abruptly last week but claimed he only received massages from Palfrey's workers and did not have sexual relations with them.
As he put it, he called "to have gals come over to the condo to give me a massage."
The Washington Post reported over the weekend that Palfrey's lawyer had been contacted by five lawyers asking whether their clients' names were on her list of as many as 15,000 telephone numbers.
Of course, this scandal could quickly fade if only "small fries" show up on the list in coming days. Stephen Hess, a political science scholar at the Brookings Institution, said, "In this world of Britney Spears and Paris Hilton, this sad, pathetic little scandal of Washington will hardly get above the fold [of newspapers]. This one can't last more than a day or so."
After her court appearance, Palfrey told reporters she was "genuinely sorry" for Tobias and his family but added that his admission that he used the service only for massages is "valuable exculpatory evidence" for her.
She said she wished he had come forward earlier. "Had he done so earlier, along with many, many others who have used my company's services throughout the years, I most likely would not be in my current predicament."
Palfrey said she turned over phone records to ABC News in hopes the network would come up with the names of clients whom she could call to testify about her service, which she contends is legal.
She said she hired college-educated women for her firm, Pamela Martin and Associates, to provide "legal, high-end erotic fantasy service" and a "refined way of life" to clients.
She asked reporters "to put aside the titillation of the who's who list at least in part and instead investigate the disturbing genesis, the confounding evolution and the equally alarming continuation of this matter."
She also said the government should prosecute those "who disobeyed my directives, their signed contracts, and participated in illegal behavior, be they a client or subcontractor."
Palfrey said the Internal Revenue Service seized her life's savings after allegations were made that she operated a prostitution business from 1993 through August 2006, when she shut down her operations and retired.
$500,000 in property seized
She has sued the government for the return of $500,000 in seized property, but a federal judge recently ruled that the criminal case against her must first be resolved.
At first, she said she thought of selling the phone records to help pay for her defense, but she changed her mind, saying "this option quickly was abandoned for fear the records would end up in the possession of an unscrupulous person or persons."
Palfrey said ABC News is under no obligation to assist her, except to help her discover the names of the clients.
"For me, this is a necessity, since the government has placed me in the untenable position whereby I do not have sufficient monies to undertake this extraordinarily expensive task on my own."
The attorney handling her civil case, Montgomery Blair Sibley, took umbrage when a reporter asked if Palfrey's tactics amounted to blackmail.
"I don't know why that's blackmail," he said. "I call that due process of law. We don't have any options left."
----------
wneikirk@tribune.com
- - -
Recurring frolic and misfortune
If power is the great aphrodisiac, then Washington is a natural habitat for sex scandals, and history provides its share of examples:
Rep. Wilbur Mills (D-Ark.)
Chairman of the powerful, tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee, was stopped by U.S. Park Police in his speeding Lincoln Continental in 1974, accompanied by Annabella Battistella. Both of them were intoxicated, and she ran from the car and jumped into the Tidal Basin. Battistella, 38, was a stripper known professionally as Fanne Fox, the "Argentine Firecracker." Though Mills, 65, won re-election that year, his career came crashing down after he appeared on the stage of Boston's Pilgrim Theater, a seedy nightspot, to get a kiss from Battistella. He later checked himself into a clinic for treatment of alcoholism and retired in 1976.
Rep. Wayne Hays, (D-Ohio)
The influential chairman of the House Administration Committee kept a woman on his office staff in the mid-1970s who claimed she was paid $14,000 a year in public money to be his mistress. Hays, then 65, at first disputed her contentions but later admitted a relationship with Elizabeth Ray, 33, who famously declared in 1976: "I can't type. I can't file. I can't even answer the phone."
President Bill Clinton
Clinton was impeached in 1998 on grounds of perjury and obstruction of justice after his affair with White House intern Monica Lewinsky became public and he was accused of trying to cover it up. In 1999, Clinton was acquitted by the Senate.
Rep. Henry Hyde (R-Ill.)
Hyde, 74, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee investigating Clinton, acknowledged in 1998 having had a five-year affair with Cherie Snodgrass in the 1960s when both of them were married. Hyde admitted the affair after an online magazine, Salon, told Hyde's office it was publishing a story about Hyde and the beauty stylist. Hyde, who had the affair while he was in his 40s, said "the statute of limitations has long since passed on my youthful indiscretions."
Rep. Bob Livingston (R-La.)
Livingston was the presumptive speaker-elect of the House and was among Republicans calling for the ouster of Clinton in 1998. Ironically, it was Livingston who resigned amid allegations of his marital infidelity.
-- Tribune staff and news services
Facts and fantasy of US sex scandal
By Alex Barker in Washington
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Published: May 4 2007 03:00 | Last updated: May 4 2007 03:00
A sex scandal that has titillated Washington gossips and led to the resignation of a senior government official seems to be moving towards a denouement today, when a television programme opens up the workings of an escort service used by members of the political establishment.
Fighting charges of running prostitutes in the US capital, Deborah Jeane Palfrey, the "DC Madam" or "Beltway Bawd", has threatened to call prominent former clients to testify that her business was a legal "sexual fantasy service".
The prospect has thrown the press into turmoil, prompting commentary on issues ranging from Ms Palfrey's stock portfolio to her red lipstick and four-inch heels.
Last week, in a development that shocked Washington and gave some credence to her threats, Randall Tobias, the deputy secretary of state in charge of foreign aid, resigned after being forced to admit he used Ms Palfrey's service. Mr Tobias had been in charge of enforcing US policy that required recipients of Aids-related funding to condemn prostitution.
Mr Tobias was caught out by 20kgs of phone bills kept by Ms Palfrey. These record the calls she made since 1993 to thousands of clients and the 130 or more women who worked for her. After offering the records to the highest bidder, she eventually gave four years of the files to ABC news last month to identify prominent men.
The results of the investigation - which included spotting Mr Tobias's number - will be aired on ABC tonight. The network says the logs include calls from and to "a Bush administration economist, the head of a conservative think-tank, a prominent CEO, several lobbyists and a handful of military officials". It has not confirmed whether these people will be named.
The candid approach puts Ms Palfrey apart from infamous American madams, such as the "Hollywood Madam" Heidi Fleiss and the "Mayflower Madam" Sydney Biddle Barrows, who are known as much for the secrets they kept as the ones they told.
Explaining her response, Montgomery Sibley, Ms Palfrey's lawyer, told the Financial Times that both he and his client had served time in prison, giving them the "strength to look a bully in the eye and kick him in the nuts".
Whatever comes of the peek into the Ms Palfrey's big black book this evening, it will at least set limits to the hitherto unchecked speculation fuelled by the defendant and her lawyer.
Ms Palfrey has claimed "the tentacles of this matter reach far, wide and high into the echelons of power in the US". By contrast, journalists at ABC only think theinvestigation warrants one segment in an hour-longtelevision programme.
Yet, even if the disclosures prove to be a disappointment, the scandal may rumble on. "What people don't appreciate is that the four years given to ABC were the slow years of a declining business," said Mr Sibley.
Whereas those records include 10 to 15 prominent clients, he said, the "go-go years of the dotcom boom and Clinton administration" could include up to 35 more noteworthy names.
Ms Palfrey and Mr Sibley have yet to decide what to do with those documents. But Mr Sibley assured the FT that if he "did not appear on a regular basis" he had made arrangements for the records to be published online "for the whole world to see".
The pair have already published a sample page of the records on Ms Palfrey's website. But this simply highlights how difficult any investigation into Ms Palfrey's claims would be.
The 10-year-old document records calls to disconnected lines, the lobby of an apartment building, and the customer services of an electricity provider.
Background
Deborah Jeane Palfrey was nicknamed the "DC Madam" after being charged with running prostitutes in Washington. She claims her business was a legal escort service and wants to call former prominent clients to testify to that effect. She gave four years of her phone records to ABC news and the network is reporting on its investigation tonight.
Randall Tobias, the deputy secretary of state, resigned last week after ABC told him his number was on Ms Palfrey's phone logs. The network says it has found numbers for a number of other prominent figures.
posted by Carlos T Mock at 8:58 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home