Los Angeles (AFP) - "Django Unchained" star Daniele Watts has accused Los Angeles police of racism after they briefly detained the African American actress and her white husband on suspicion of engaging in prostitution.

Watts and her husband said they were handcuffed, detained and questioned after the pair showed affection in public on Thursday. They say Watts's wrist was cut while being handcuffed.

The Los Angeles Police Department said Sunday it had responded to a radio call from a concerned citizen about "indecent exposure" inside a silver Mercedes with the door open.

Following the pair's arrest, "upon further investigation it was determined that no crime had been committed" and they were released, the LAPD said.

The incident took place in Studio City, an upscale neighborhood of north Los Angeles.

"Today I was handcuffed and detained by 2 police officers from the Studio City Police Department after refusing to agree that I had done something wrong by showing affection, fully clothed, in a public place," Watts wrote on her Facebook page on Thursday.

"As I was sitting in the back of the police car, I remembered the countless times my father came home frustrated or humiliated by the cops when he had done nothing wrong.

"I felt his shame, his anger, and my own feelings of frustration for existing in a world where I have allowed myself to believe that 'authority figures' could control my BEING... my ability to BE!!!!!!! "

Photos of the "Weeds" and "How I Met Your Mother" television series actress posted a photograph of the encounter in which Watts, dressed in a white T-shirt, colorful shorts and sneakers, could be seen crying, her hands behind her back, while standing next to a police officer.

"I could tell that whoever called on us (including the officers), saw a tatted RAWKer white boy and a hot bootie shorted black girl and thought we were a HO (prostitute) & a TRICK (client)," her husband Brian James Lucas said.

"Our freedom isn't freedom folks, when people can abuse others with no reason or evidence at all just because they "think" they have been given the power by people that are ONLY equal to us."

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British households are spending about $20 billion per year on drugs and prostitutes, according to figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) released on Tuesday.

British statisticians have estimated sales of illegal drugs and sexual services before, but this is the first time it has been officially added to figures on Britain's economic spending. 

Household spending, or what the ONS calls total household final consumption expenditure (HHFCE) was £12.33 billion ($20 billion) higher in 2012 because of “illegal activities,” primarily “narcotic drugs and prostitution,” the new report found. 

The UK is not the only country adding illegal spending to its estimates. Italy's national accounts will also be changed to reflect drugs and prostitution expenditure. But they will have to spend big to beat the UK: between 1997 and 2013, illegal activities have been added about 1.4% to overall British household spending.

In the second quarter, spending on drugs added £1.67bn, according to the ONS. That’s slightly more than the UK spent on wine and cider, which came in at £1.54bn for the same three-month period.

Prostitution was smaller in the same quarter, with spending at about £1.42 billion. That’s closing in on hairdressing, salons, and personal grooming establishments:

The US does not add spending on illegal activities to their economic figures, but it is not off the cards, according to the New York Times. The Bureau of Economic Analysis says that it needs to "look at the issue more closely."

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Prostitutes in the idyllic city of Salzburg, Austria, will soon receive checks for more $2,000 each after a state law that required them to undergo medical checks didn't pass a court review, the local newspaper Heute first reported.

Prostitution and brothels are legal in Austria, but subject to strict laws including regular medical exams for workers.

In the western province of Salzburg, the Social Democratic party government has required since 2010 that prostitutes pay for their own medical visits, which cost €35 ($44.50) each. But the new Austrian People's Party majority ruled that as these visits were a requirement introduced by the government, they should have been covered by the state. The decision resulted in a €1 million ($1.3 million) bill of compensation.

It all started when the owner of the local brothel Babylon, Richard Schweiger, approached the provincial government asking for more flexible visits for his staff. Sex workers are required to get checked every week. The inquiry discovered a lack of legal basis for enforcing the law, and that let Schweiger request compensation for expenses incurred between 2010 and 2014.

He demanded €200,000 ($250,000), but the figure is set to go up. Speaking to The Local newspaper, the provincial financial officer Christian Stöckl commented: "fees were introduced illegally; and so we will have to pay back this money upon request. When we have to pay back charges levied over the past three years, a sum between 800,000 and one million Euros ($1 million-$1.3 million) is the result."

In Salzburg there are about 600 registered prostitutes, each of whom could request up to €1,670 ($2,100) for compensation.

SEE ALSO: The British Are Spending $20 Billion On Illegal Drugs And Prostitutes

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Since her husband walked out on her a year ago, Sumana has commuted from a rented slum house in south-eastern Delhi to sit by a busy road in the city centre.

Dressed in a floral-print salwar kameez and with kohl around her eyes, she picks up two or three customers a day for sex.

Mostly they are car chauffeurs, who pay as little as 300 rupees ($4.80) a time. Some, she says, are generous or gentle, but there is also violence.

Sumana sticks to daylight hours. Her family thinks she has an office job, which is what she would prefer. But she has no education, and she will carry on until her teenage son finishes school. She knows soliciting is illegal — though the law is vague on prostitution itself. She understands the benefits of condoms, yet her customers rarely wear one.

Sumana has no pimp; nor was she trafficked. The same goes for Bina, a younger woman nearby who arranges to meet higher-paying men by phone: guards, drivers and cooks who pass around her number. She complains of long hours.

Officials say India has over 3 milllion sex workers. It is unclear how many, like Sumana and Bina, opt for the business because they need the money, and how many are forced by others. Bharati Dey, president of the All India Network of Sex Workers, argues that prostitution is a matter of choice, and that sex workers should have rights like anyone else.

The industry has grown as women, notably ill-educated rural migrants, enter India's labour market in larger numbers. Most find low-paid or casual work; for a minority, selling sex is a relatively well-paid option.

Ms Dey's and other groups want the sex trade brought out of the shadows. In April the UN's special rapporteur on violence against women said ending India's de facto criminalisation of sex workers would make them less vulnerable. Five years ago the Supreme Court said prostitution should be legalised.

So, now, does the National Commission for Women, a federal body, changing its previous stance. Its head, Lalitha Kumaramangalam, argues that a regulated industry could better stop forcible trafficking, including of children, improve hygiene among workers and clients and limit the spread of HIV and other diseases. On November 8th she will make the case before a special panel of the Supreme Court looking at amending the law.

Openness and regulation bring benefits. Mayank Austen Soofi, who has written in depth about the brothels of G.B. Road, a sprawling red-light district in Delhi dating back to the Mughal era, says that every sex worker he knows wants to be legal. Prostitutes today hesitate to approach doctors. They dread police harassment. And they fear their landlords will expel them.

A priority should be ending forced prostitution, especially of children. Apne Aap, an anti-trafficking group, says brokers pay as little as 4,000 rupees to the families of village girls who are then raped by customers. Raids of brothels by NGOs and police to rescue victims often fail because families later return the children to the same brokers. In other cases girls and young women are tricked with promises of marriage. Apne Aap claims that over a third of all sex workers are under 18.

The organisation opposes legalisation, arguing that more demand for sex would lead to more trafficking. Instead, Apne Aap's campaign, "Cool Men Don't Buy Sex", is intended to reduce demand. If that looks unlikely to have much success, the prospects of legalisation appear slender, too. No politician is ready to champion the idea. The conservative Bharatiya Janata Party is unlikely to support it. Those selling sex will continue to live in the shadows.

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Drunk driving is a major cause of accidents and deaths in India. To do its bit for the society and spread awareness about the menace, Mission Sharing Knowledge (MSK), which is an open editorial platform, has released a short, hard-hitting film, in partnership with a Mumbai-based filmmaker. The video has gone viral which means that more and more people are now aware of what drunk driving can do to families of people involved.

Called 'My Husband made me a Prostitute,' the video is directed by Pankaj Thakur and scripted by Joybrato Dutta. The movie is a fictional, first-person account of a well-read lady who resorts to prostitution to run her family after her husband meets with an accident due to drunk driving and falls in coma.

The movie ends with a message that reads, "It's your family who'll pay the price. Don't drink and drive."

Commenting on the initiative, Rohit Sakunia, founder, Mission Sharing Knowledge, said, "With India reporting as many as [134,000] fatalities in road accidents every year, a vast 70% of them being due to drunken driving. 'My Husband made me a Prostitute' is a shout to all those people who boast of their driving ability when drunk. We urge them to be extra careful and avoid this habit because if god forbids anything goes wrong, it's your family who will pay the price lifelong."

Writer Joybrato Dutta too has something to say about his film, "Though it is a fictional tale, yet it's the story of numerous families who are living in the dark due to one fatal decision taken by the head of the family. My concept behind the piece was to bring to light the bitter journey a family has to embark on and the harsh pain they live every day when their important member chooses to drink and then drive. I thank Mission Sharing Knowledge for publishing the story and Pankaj Thakur for making it come alive and creating a heart rending film on it."

The 3-minute video was posted yesterday on YouTube and has been viewed over 4,01,548 times since then. It has also been shared by many websites and has gone viral big time.

You can watch the video here:

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Sheri's Ranch is a legal brothel outside Las Vegas that claims to be a favorite stop for people visiting the Consumer Electronic Show in Las Vegas. Re/code reports that business at the brothel increases 70% during the week that CES is held. 

Back in 2013, Dylan Love visited Sheri's Ranch to meet the women who work there:

The world's oldest profession has been legal in parts of Nevada since 1971, but is unambiguously illegal everywhere else. I had arranged a non-participatory visit to see how this oasis of vice works, and Sheri's Ranch, a legal brothel in Nevada's Nye County (NSFW), sent a black Town Car to pick me up from my hotel in Las Vegas.

Getting there

Anyone wanting to legally exchange money for sex has to get out of Las Vegas to do so. Sheri's Ranch is in Pahrump, Nev., a rural desert community an hour outside Vegas where prostitution is legal, alive, and well. (Incidentally it's also where forgotten Apple co-founder Ron Wayne currently calls home.)

The drive from downtown Vegas to Pahrump is an exploration of big empty space, armadillos, and dead cell zones. My driver, Fabio, is a full-time employee of Sheri's Ranch. He makes the two-hour drive from Vegas to Pahrump back to Vegas a few times a day, discreetly getting customers from their downtown hotel suites to Sheri's front door and back. A placard on the seat in front of me reads "The ride is completely complimentary but a gratuity is greatly appreciated."

Were we in his other car, Fabio tells me, he has a DVD player for customers to watch short ads for each girl at the Ranch, something akin to movie trailers before the main attraction. If people start asking him questions about specific girls, he puts it on for them to watch. He's happy to answer customers' general questions, but he's not supposed to comment on specific women in case he were to recommend some over others.

Getting acquainted with Sheri's Ranch

With the exception of one sign on the front reading "Girls Girls Girls," Sheri's Ranch may as well be a sports bar. In fact it is a sports bar. There are literally two separate entrances to the building — door No.1 for beer and wings, door No.2 for more sensual pleasures. I started with door No.1.

The sports bar side has a low-light atmosphere for drinking, eating, socializing, and — my New York City eyes couldn't believe it – smoking indoors! It is homey, low-key, and immediately comfortable. I grab a booth and a gin and tonic to sit and talk with Dena, the madam of Sheri's Ranch.

Dena lives in Pahrump and likes to knit when she's not at work. As madam of the Ranch, she fills something of a motherly role for the girls who work here, seeing to their needs and making sure that the day-to-day operations of the Ranch are running smoothly. She facilitates the relationship between employer and employee.

Dena showed me around the grounds. There's the main building that houses the restaurant and the girls, but behind it is plenty more. A pool and some palm trees. Themed bungalows for some extra privacy from the main house. A "fantasy playland" for acting out more elaborate sexual encounters — a locker room, a reception area, and so on. You get the gist.

The same way that there are plenty of people who come to the sports bar just to have a meal, there are people who come just to stay in the Ranch's hotel. A full-fledged hotel sits on the property a fair distance behind the main house, and it's there for anyone needing a place to stay, whether you're just visiting Pahrump or making an extended go of things at Sheri's.

Behind the bungalows is the rest of the Ranch's 310 acres — dry, undeveloped desert that butts right up against the Nevada-California state line. On this side of the line, Sheri's Ranch operates without issue. Move just a couple miles west and it'd be a different story.

How to get a job as a prostitute

There seem to be as many stories of breaking into the prostitution business as there are women working here. Dena told me that very rarely is this business a woman's plan.

Women seeking work at Sheri's need to be licensed independent contractors for the state of Nevada and complete an application process with the Ranch. You can see the application page here (NSFW). They request nothing more than a few photos of your face and body, but it's difficult to stand out on that alone.

That's why there's a comments section of the application as well. Prospective employees are advised to demonstrate some personality. Once you get the go-ahead to come work a tour, they'll even pick you up from the airport in a limousine.

Aaron, the brothel's marketing director, told me that "there's never been a problem filling slots at Sheri's. It's only ever been a matter of who to say yes to."

I met three of the prostitutes who got a yes.

The women of Sheri's Ranch

"The No. 1 misconception about places like this is that the girls are here against their will. But that's just not true," Dena tells me.

The word "whorehouse" often inspires seedy images of broken women, scored with a Tom Waits song. At Sheri's, that's all just movie nonsense. The women here seem to do quite well for themselves, operating as independent contractors who set their own prices. They got a little evasive when I asked specific questions about money, but I left with the impression that you can expect to spend anywhere from a few hundred dollars on the basic side of things to thousands of dollars and more at the other end of the spectrum. Obviously this depends on your tastes and the girl's prices.



Amber Lynn trades time between Florida and Pahrump – two weeks on at Sheri's Ranch, two weeks at home with her boyfriend.

Erin is new here, a former marine who started escorting independently in Louisiana before coming to Sheri's so that she could continue the work without worry of legal repercussions.

Destini is a family woman, married with a child. She disclosed that she'd had some run-ins with the law while working as an escort elsewhere, but as an employee of Sheri's Ranch there's no worry of that happening. Even though she's wearing a distracting robe and lingerie, there's a maternal glow in her face when she talks about her child, and it totally steals the scene.

I find myself especially intrigued with her story. She's a happily married mom and working prostitute. Does she ever worry about having a healthy relationship with sex?

"All it takes to have a healthy relationship with sex is to enjoy it. And I enjoy it! A lot of the guys that come through here are shy, or disabled, or just haven't had good experiences with women. I get to make them feel loved," Destini says. Her smile is so big as she speaks that I know she means it. The other girls nod in agreement.

The longer I talk to them, the more it feels like I'm talking to employees of a conventional business, a resort or hotel, maybe. I guess you could say they're in the ultimate customer service industry.

Dena asks Destini the question I would ask were I less afraid of offending her: "What's it like in the bedroom when you get home from the job?"

Destini laughs at the ceiling. "I rape my husband when I get home! I say 'Come here, baby! I missed you!'"



The unsexy logistics of it all

Girls at the Ranch work one "tour" at a time, a contractual stay at the Ranch that can last five days on the short end and up to two weeks or longer. When they're on the clock, the girls work 12-hour shifts, either 5 AM to 5 PM or vice versa. While on her tour, a woman isn't allowed to approach the Ranch's hotel area or talk to its guests — to do so would be solicitation.



The womens' rooms are situated down a long hallway. The layout is reminiscent of a college dorm, and the women live and work in their rooms full-time. Considering they each pay $46 a day in rent and sleep in the rooms nightly, they decorate to suit their tastes and personalities. Apart from the room rent, the only other financial arrangement between the brothel and the women working there is that the brothel takes 50% of what they make.

Condom use: mandatory. Placards placed throughout every room serve as a perpetual reminder to be safe and sanitary. A physician comes by once a week to give all the girls a health screening, and before any sexual activity takes place behind closed doors, males go through a quick visual screening, called a "DC," or "dick check." 

Everyone I asked maintains that there's yet to be an instance of sexually transmitted disease tied to legalized prostitution since the industry kicked off in Nevada 42 years ago.

How to legally solicit a hooker

Make an appointment ahead of time or just drop by at your convenience — Sheri's is open 24/7/365, so you're never going to catch them unprepared to receive you.

When you walk through the "Girls Girls Girls" door, you are treated to the "lineup," in which the girls who are on the clock come to meet you, tell you their names, vamp a little bit, and wait for you to pick one of them. (You can conduct an impromptu lineup of your own over the Internet by seeing who's currently at the Ranch [NSFW]). The two of you will go to her room, chat it up, and make arrangements on what you'd like to do and how much you'd like to spend. After reaching an agreement, you pay, you partake, and you're on your way.

 Maybe get a burger on the way out.

How to start a legal brothel

That all-important business cliché applies to prostitution as well: Location, location, location. If you're opening up in the U.S., you can only be located in certain counties in Nevada. Your operation, just like prostitution in any form, is illegal everywhere else in the country.



Chuck Lee is the owner and operator (NSFW) of Sheri's Ranch. He's a Nevada native and former homicide detective who earned a nice windfall for himself when he sold his share of an especially successful Oldsmobile dealership. He used the money to get Sheri's Ranch off the ground, and it took quite a bit of doing.

Before he could so much as put that "Girls Girls Girls" sign on the door, Chuck had to pass a background check to satisfy area officials that he was an upstanding citizen. Then he wrote several fat checks to local government and turned the crank of bureaucracy to get all the required permits to serve food, beer, liquor, and well, sex.

Chuck estimates it cost $20 million over the years to get Sheri's Ranch to where it is today. By setting the bar this high, both financially and bureaucratically, Nevada makes it very difficult for unsavory characters to get into the business. Nevada's legal brothels have to meet all the usual regulations of a local business, and then they have to adhere to stricter prostitution laws on top of that.

Rounding it up

Sheri's Ranch is a compelling demonstration that legalized and well-regulated prostitution can be safe, functional, and profitable. There are 18 other legal brothels operating throughout Nevada today.

There's an ineffable welcoming quality to Sheri's Ranch. There is no shame, no fear, no judgment to be found anywhere near the place. There's no illusion to maintain — you've arrived, hat in hand, to pay for sex. Not only do the ladies know this, but they're glad you're here. Where America's sexual culture seems far more repressed than that of other countries, Sheri's turns this paradigm on its ear and welcomes you to indulge in (mostly) whatever it is you want. Their business depends on it.

While you'll have to leave Las Vegas to get here, the slogan still applies: What happens in Pahrump stays in Pahrump, but it's because cell service is too spotty to tell anyone anything.

Because some will likely wonder, the answer is no, I did not have sex with a prostitute for this story.

This post was originally written by Dylan Love.

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Yesterday one of the more remarkable scandals in the history of the US Navy more or less wrapped up when its kingpin pleaded guilty to a raft of charges centering on bribery and defrauding the Defense Department to the tune of tens of millions of dollars.

Leonard Francis, a Malaysian known universally as Fat Leonard for his impressive girth, headed Glenn Defense Marine Asia (GDMA) in Singapore, a firm that got rich by servicing and repairing US Navy ships, not altogether legally.

This line of work is rife with corruption, particularly in the seedier ports of the Western Pacific, but Fat Leonard brought this rigged game into the twenty-first century.

He bribed Navy officials, plying them with liquor, gifts, cash, and rented women. Yet Fat Leonard kicked it to a new level by ferreting classified reports from his Navy friends, sensitive information about ship deployments which allowed GDMA to steer lucrative repair contracts away from low-revenue ports like Singapore and toward “fat revenue” ports like Phuket in Thailand.

Given the number of US Navy ships of the Seventh Fleet operating in those waters, the money came easy once Fat Leonard had his machine in place.

This began in 2004, with the buying — or at least renting — of favors and classified information from Navy officials. And for five years the going was good. But by 2009, Federal investigators grew suspicious of how GDMA was making so much off the Defense Department. Soon the Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) was on the case, looking into what Fat Leonard was up to.

Like any good businessman with a clever and sneaky mind, Fat Leonard turned the tables on NCIS by penetrating them while Navy investigators tried to determine what GDMA was up to.

The golden source was a senior NCIS agent who was in regular contact with Fat Leonard, sharing with him what was going on with the classified NCIS investigation into GDMA and allowing Fat Leonard to avoid the collapse of his corrupt empire until late 2013.

The agent, John Beliveau, was paid, as usual, with cash, gifts, and prostitutes in a touch worthy of a Coen brothers film, he had recently been named NCIS Agent of the Year.

Fat Leonard’s ability to recruit the right source cannot be judged less than impressive, and his stable of dirty Navy officials included a commander holding the number-two job at Navy Fleet Logistics Command in Japan, plus another Seventh Fleet commander who shared classified information about ship movements.

In another touch worthy of the Coen brothers, he was paid once with tickets to a Lady Gaga concert.

Of greatest concern, Fat Leonard’s network of friends included two Navy admirals, who “just happened” to be among the Navy’s most senior intelligence officials.

Despite allegations of “personal misconduct” against both admirals, neither has yet been charged with anything relating to the GDMA scandal although their security clearances were suspended by the Secretary of the Navy.

This led to the bizarre situation that Vice Admiral Ted Branch spent a year serving as the Director of Naval Intelligence while being totally unable to do his job since he could see no classified information. After a year of this odd situation, VADM Branch was finally replaced.

Needless to add, mere mortals who are not three-star admirals would not be allowed to stay in their jobs without clearances, while the lower-ranking — say a junior officer or any enlisted sailor — would be thrown to the wolves without delay.

This is the crux of the matter. In recent years, the US Navy has put on a good show regarding ethics. The mantra “Honor, Courage, Commitment” gets recited a lot and the mandatory reeducation sessions are positively Maoist in their intensity.

Unlike the other armed services, the Navy is willing to relieve commanders at the O5/O6 level almost casually over misconduct allegations, which sends the message that those trusted with command are expected to live up to Navy values.

This sounds impressive but any credit the Navy gets is undone by the widespread toleration of gross corruption as evidenced by Fat Leonard and his rigged game.

The Navy is at pains to explain that Fat Leonard is an “isolated incident” that demonstrates nothing about the state of the Navy.

However, those who have served in the Navy know otherwise.

Every single Navy command I’ve seen up-close, as an officer or as a civilian, had some flavor of the crimes — sorry, problems — demonstrated with the GDMA disaster. But these usually went unreported, since calling up the Inspector General can easily invite career suicide.

Navy leadership is at this point is only fooling itself. The details of a recent internal Navy study are shocking, particularly the lack of trust in senior leadership felt by sailors.

Only eighteen percent of the sailors surveyed said morale was “good,” with forty-two percent describing morale as “poor” or “marginal” while fully half of those surveyed had no interest in moving up the chain of command themselves. To quote the study:

37.2 percent regard senior leadership as ‘marginal’ or ‘poor,’ a plurality state they do not trust senior leaders, 51.3 percent don’t believe senior leaders care what they think and 50.1 percent of sailors do not believe senior leaders hold themselves accountable

These sad numbers generated the usual blather about how admirals “get it” and the Navy is “working on this.” Nobody who knows the service believes this.

The very public nature of the Fat Leonard scandal has forced the Navy to confront the rot in its senior ranks, but to date there have only been weak promises that “this time will be different.”

If the Navy expects to win the next war, it needs to restore confidence in its integrity, especially to its junior sailors, who see senior officers and admirals getting rich and living the high life while their own careers, and often lives, can be ruined over a whiff of scandal regarding drink or women of the kind that sailors until recently would have termed “the weekend.” Puritanism for the lower ranks and wild (illegal) partying for the higher ranks is a great way to destroy morale.

The FBI needs to be brought in to figure out what really happened in the Fat Leonard drama, since the NCIS was itself compromised in the scandal. Moreover its track record on high-profile investigations is less than stellar. There are troubling counterintelligence aspects of the GDMA story that need full and proper investigation.

Additionally, a high-ranking panel must be convened by the Pentagon to produce recommendations on how to clean up Navy culture, particularly among the senior ranks.

No currently serving admirals should be involved since they cannot be trusted to be impartial. But there are several retired admirals of genuine integrity out there who are deeply concerned about the state of the Navy and would be ideal here. And they are in the phone book.

The American public deserves believable assurances that the Fat Leonard scandal will not be repeated, and junior officers and enlisted sailors need to feel confident that there are not two tiers of expectations and justice in the US Navy.

If that is not repaired, and morale in the fleet is not properly restored, the consequences may be dire indeed, and played out in the Western Pacific sooner than you think.

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Greg Anthony has been suspended indefinitely by CBS following his arrest on solicitation charges.

A CBS spokeswoman says "Greg Anthony will not be working again for CBS this season."

District of Columbia police say the CBS basketball analyst and former NBA player has been arrested and charged with soliciting a prostitute.

Lt. Kelvin Cusick tells The Associated Press that Anthony was arrested at 5:46 p.m. on Friday. He said Saturday that Anthony faces a misdemeanor solicitation charge that's punishable by up to 180 days in jail.

Cusick says the 47-year-old Anthony was released Friday evening.

Anthony had been scheduled to announce the Michigan State-Maryland men's basketball game Saturday in nearby College Park, Maryland.

In the NBA, Anthony played 11 seasons with six teams from 1991 to 2002, including the New York Knicks and Portland Trail Blazers. The guard and defensive specialist averaged 7.3 points per game.

In college he was on the University of Nevada, Las Vegas team that won the 1990 NCAA tournament, with teammates Larry Johnson and Stacey Augmon.

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NEW YORK (Reuters) - Some charities that have received money from U.S. financier Jeffrey Epstein said they are reviewing their relationships with him or will decline to accept any future gifts from him in the wake of recent allegations he forced an underage girl to have sex with Britain's Prince Andrew and other powerful men.

Epstein, 62, who pleaded guilty in 2008 to procuring an underage girl for prostitution and served a year in a Florida jail, has long burnished his reputation as a philanthropist through a series of foundations that he says have given millions of dollars to institutions ranging from Harvard University to a New York junior tennis league.

The allegations involving Epstein became a tabloid sensation on both sides of the Atlantic after lawyers for one of Epstein's accusers made them in a court filing just over a month ago. It prompted strong denials from Prince Andrew and from prominent U.S. lawyer Alan Dershowitz, who was also accused of having sex with the girl.

The filing has also renewed questions about Epstein's once close links to former U.S. President Bill Clinton, though there are no allegations of any wrongdoing by Clinton.

In interviews with Reuters, three recipients of Epstein's money said they would accept no more gifts, at least while the recent allegations are under review. They are a cancer researcher at New York City's Mount Sinai hospital who with colleagues received $50,000 in seed funding; a mentoring program for young Swedish businesswomen that got $30,000; and Ballet Palm Beach in Florida, which declined to say how much Epstein gave.

"The further I can keep myself from anything like that the better," Ballet Palm Beach founder Colleen Smith said in a phone interview.

Epstein did not respond to interview requests. In response to two pages of written questions from Reuters, a lawyer for Epstein said the financier's philanthropy has been widespread for an extensive period of time.

"His efforts include making substantial contributions to scientific and medical progress and in helping children in providing them with the educational and technological tools necessary for their having a chance to succeed," the lawyer, Martin Weinberg, said in an emailed statement. "It would be unfortunate if the recent media activity would in any way adversely impact Mr. Epstein's efforts in any of these areas," he added.  

DIFFERENT WALKS OF LIFE

Well before Epstein went to jail, he saw philanthropy as a way to bring together people from different walks of life in settings ranging from his own mansions to academic conferences, friends said.

"His interest is in interesting people and interesting ideas," said Arizona State University physicist Lawrence Krauss, who directs a program on the origins of life that Epstein has supported. He said he would feel cowardly if he turned away from Epstein because of accusations Krauss knew nothing about.

Epstein has touted his philanthropy through regular press releases, such as one in November that referred to him as "an unusual Harvard investor and private financier."

According to publicly available tax records, Epstein has given money through at least three foundations. One of the three dissolved in 2012, and a second disbursed only $107,000 in a recent 12-month period, according to its tax return.

For the third foundation, named the J. Epstein Virgin Islands Foundation Inc but also doing business as Enhanced Education, the most recent tax return Reuters could locate was from 2002. Epstein's primary residence is a private island off St. Thomas in the U.S. Virgin Islands.

Epstein's total donations are difficult to estimate because Reuters had access only to publicly available tax records for foundations where there was confirmation of a link to Epstein.

In two cases, Epstein boasted about donations he never made, a major university said. In a July 2014 press release, Epstein claimed he provided "critical funding" for scientists at Harvard and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to restore five Mark Rothko murals, and in a September 2014 press release, he said he gave money to the MIT Media Lab to teach toddlers computer programming.

The Rothko press release "was simply not correct, and was issued without our knowledge or agreement," and the toddler press release was also "completely incorrect," said MIT Media Lab spokeswoman Alexandra Kahn in an email. A press release issued by the Harvard Art Museums on the Rothko project credited eight funding sources, none of them Epstein. An MIT press release on the toddlers credited five sources, and Epstein was not among them.

Epstein did not respond to questions about the MIT programs.     

MILLIONS TO HARVARD

The recipient of one of the largest donations from Epstein has been Harvard, to which Epstein pledged $30 million in 2003, according to news reports at the time. By 2006, when charges against Epstein were made public in Florida, he had fulfilled at least $6.5 million of that pledge, the reports said. Harvard's then president said he would not return the money because it was doing good for science.

Harvard declined to comment to Reuters, citing donor privacy.

Epstein's philanthropy website, jeffreyepstein.org, had until recently listed about 20 charities he gave to last year. By last week, the page was no longer visible.

Little is known publicly about how Epstein made his money. He has said that, after working at investment bank Bear Stearns beginning in the 1970s, he managed assets for billionaires such as Leslie Wexner, founder of Victoria's Secret parent L Brands Inc.

The latest allegations against Epstein emerged on Dec. 30 when lawyers said in a Florida federal court filing that Epstein trafficked a teenager for sexual purposes to prominent businessmen and public figures. The woman and other accusers are asking a judge to examine Epstein's 2008 plea agreement with the U.S. Justice Department to see whether their rights as victims were violated.  

NOT GIVING IT BACK

No group interviewed by Reuters said it would give back money. Doris Germain, an associate professor at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, said she could not return the money because it was spent more than a year ago on breast cancer research.

"I don't think I would accept money from him anymore, but then you sort of wonder," Germain said. "We happen to know what he's done, but what about all the other people who are giving money to foundations? We don't know what they're doing. Is it all clean? I don't know."

Epstein's money has been refused before. In 2006, Eliot Spitzer, a Democrat then running to become governor of New York, returned about $50,000 in campaign contributions, news reports said. Spitzer did not respond to a request for comment.

In 2006, one of Epstein's three foundations gave $25,000 to Bill Clinton's foundation, according to tax records. Clinton's foundation did not respond to requests for comment.

Epstein flew Clinton to Africa in 2002 to talk about anti-poverty and anti-AIDS programs. And according to flight records obtained by the website Gawker, the former U.S. president traveled on Epstein's jet at least 10 other times between 2002 and 2003.

Reuters was unable to independently confirm the flights. Clinton could not be reached for comment.

At least two grant recipients in academia are standing by Epstein, saying he remains a friend: Krauss and Robert Trivers, a Rutgers University biologist. Trivers said Epstein is a person of integrity who should be given credit for serving time in prison and for settling civil lawsuits brought by women who said they were abused.

"Did he get an easy deal? Did he buy himself a light sentence? Well, yes, probably, compared to what you or I would get, but he did get locked up," Trivers said. He said he got about $40,000 from Epstein to study the relationship between knee symmetry and sprinting ability.

Trivers also said he believes girls mature earlier than in the past. "By the time they're 14 or 15, they're like grown women were 60 years ago, so I don't see these acts as so heinous," he said.

Another recipient of Epstein's foundations, Ira Lamster, a former dean of the Columbia University dental school, said he has not asked Epstein for funding since getting $100,000 about three years ago to study the relationship between diabetes and oral health.

"Am I glad I didn't go back for additional funding?" he said. "I guess I am, but in my interactions with him, he was always a gentleman." 

(Reporting by David Ingram; Editing by Amy Stevens, Noeleen Walder and Martin Howell)

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Newsweek's cover this week featured an in-depth story on sex trafficking in the United States.

The author, Max Kutner, reports that people run these operations from metropolitan areas, especially Queens, and then transport the women to areas of male-dominated industry, such as fracking and migrant farming, to sell themselves.

"These organizations that victimize these women … transport them to where the business is," special agent in charge of Homeland Security Investigations in New York James T. Hayes Jr. told Newsweek.

The piece focuses on one woman, known only as Janet. She grew up in Tenancingo, Mexico, largely considered the sex trafficking capital of the world. There, her boyfriend forced her into prostitution and then moved them to Queens. 

About twice a month, a van takes Janet and other women, some as young as 12, to Charlotte, North Carolina, where they're forced to have sex with complete strangers.

Traffickers choose Queens specifically because of its proximity to many other cities along the East Coast and a huge client base within New York City itself. Then, pimps take women to farms from Vermont all the way down to Florida, trapping them in a "city-to-farm sex pipeline," as Kutner puts it. Since 2011, prosecutors have dealt with two separate cases of women from Queens being transported to Vermont farms for sex.

During the day, Janet and the other women go to migrant worker camps on farms in Charlotte. There, men paid $30 to violently rape her, although rates range from $25 to $30. Then, at night, they'd go to work at brothels in Charlotte — but not before calling their pimps to report how much money they made on the farm.

“Your body is being sold,” Janet told Newsweek in Spanish through an interpreter. “It’s almost like your body is no longer yours.”

According to the State Department, 18,000 more women are trafficked into the US every year, making the country the second highest destination in the world.

Newsweek notes that experts can't specifically say how many women are being trafficked in city-to-farm pipelines, though they know that the problem grows every year.

In any case, migrant workers provide the perfect clientele. Because many of them have undocumented status, "they are set up to be invisible," Renan Salgado of the Worker Justice Center of New York told Newsweek.

They rarely leave their farms, making them bored, lonely, and dependent on middlemen for almost everything. 

While the Mexican Consulate in New York City finally freed Janet from her nightmarish life, she spent 11 years enslaved.

Read the rest of Janet's story in Newsweek here »

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NOW WATCH: This Flying Car Is Real And It Can Fly 430 Miles On A Full Tank

An escort agency in Barcelona bought up one of the highly sought-after billboards on the main road from the center of the city into the Mobile World Congress venue.

And it appeared right next to one of Samsung's outdoor ads.

Escorts and prostitutes flock upon Barcelona's hotels and bars as the huge mobile trade show takes place each year as they look to take home top-price rates from wealthy business people.

That's not all, according to two Facebook users commenting on the billboard photo posted by MWC-goer Helen Keegan, the Apricots escort agency website also used the official GSMA Mobile World Congress logo on its website, with a banner-type ad stating "We are ready."

The GSMA, which organizes MWC, has now "taken action" on the unauthorized use of its logo and branding on the website, according to Facebook user Maria Shiao Di Francesco. She said she had been emailed by GSMA director general Anne Bouverot, who Di Francesco says is "determined not to let MWC become a CES under her watch." CES is the electronics trade show that takes place in Las Vegas each year. It became a hotspot for commercial sex several years ago when a porn trade show was held at the same time. The two shows' schedules have since been changed to avoid that. 

However, while the GSMA may have forced the removal of its logo from the Apricots website, it is clear the agency is still very much targeting the last remaining MWC delegates. A blog post still appears on its website advising users to "be careful with taxis during the Mobile World Congress of Barcelona." It goes on to advise that taxi drivers with passengers asking to go to a brothel will often drive to a different one, which charges higher rates.

A GSMA spokeswoman told Business Insider: "We absolutely do not condone prostitution or the exploitation of women at our event. We are constantly monitoring and addressing issues as we are made aware of them. In this particular case, the company was using the Mobile World Congress logo on their website. This has now been removed. Billboards that do not specifically reference Mobile World Congress or our brand are beyond our direct control, but we are working with the city of Barcelona to address these issues in the future. We are committed as an organisation to making our event a positive environment for all attendees and will continue to focus resources to ensure this."

On Wednesday there was a small protest outside the main Fira Gran Via Mobile World Congress venue. Protesters bore signs which read: "Real men don't buy girls."

This is not the first year MWC has been plunged into controversy around the sex trade. In 2012 the GSMA kicked out and banned Russian telecoms company CBOSS from the show. The company had been handing out leaflets offering visitors "champagne, caviar and a beautiful girl" if they attended business briefings. 

Prostitution in Spain is not illegal, but nor is it regulated by authorities. However, Barcelona recently introduced fines for prostitutes working and clients picking up sex workers on the street.

SEE ALSO: More coverage of Mobile World Congress 2015

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WILLISTON, N.D. (AP) — When she first arrived in town, Windie Lazenko headed to the neon-lit strip clubs and bars catering to lonely oil field workers with extra cash and time on their hands.

She knew these were likely gathering spots for the sex trade — the life she'd given up long ago.

For nearly two decades, Lazenko was part of that illicit world, starting as a 13-year-old runaway when, she says, she was bought and sold for sex.

Prostitution, pornography and strip clubs followed. Then she walked away from it all. She eventually moved to Montana and a few years ago, while counseling at-risk girls, she began hearing about young women being recruited for prostitution in the Bakken oilfields. She wanted to help.

Lazenko is now one of the most prominent activists in the fight against sex trafficking in the oil patch. She's worked with federal prosecutors, the FBI and police, testified before state lawmakers and addressed church and school groups. She also has formed an advocacy-resource group, 4her North Dakota, reaching out to victimized women.

"I speak their language from the get-go," she says. "I'm not law enforcement. I'm not out there to bust them. They don't have to play the game with me. They're going to respect me and I'm going to respect them. We're going to have a conversation. I know what it is to be out there."

Lazenko's advocacy comes as state lawmakers are considering an array of new measures — including stiffer penalties for pimps and more money to help victims — to combat the growing sex trade in the Bakken. "It's powerful for them to say human trafficking is here in North Dakota," she says. "It's just huge that they've acknowledged it."

In Congress, several bipartisan bills are pending designed to crack down on trafficking and ensure that minors who are sold for sex are treated as victims, not criminals. Sen. Heidi Heitkamp, a North Dakota Democrat and co-sponsor of several of these measures, has been among the most vocal legislators focusing on this problem, bringing federal officials to the state to train authorities on how to identify trafficking and looking for ways to stem the activity through websites.

Law enforcement says the Bakken is a made-to-order market for sex trafficking: Thousands of men, far from home and families, are holed up in a remote place with ready cash and not many places to spend it. Bars and strip clubs are one option. Online sites also are filled with local ads such as "Body 2 Body Experience" or "Come Enjoy Your WILDEST FANTASIES 2 Girl Show Available."

After settling in North Dakota in late 2013, Lazenko quickly familiarized herself with the local sex-for-sale business. "It was pretty blatant," she says. She noticed less visible signs, too — the motel, for instance, where a broken back-door lock conveniently allowed johns to slip in without having to pass the front desk.

In the past year or so, Lazenko says she's helped several trafficking victims — arranging for women to be taken to shelters after they've fled their pimps or even opening her own apartment to them. She's also escorted some women to court hearings or meetings with prosecutors trying to make cases against traffickers.

At 46, Lazenko, is a grandmother of three, but in her short leather jacket, jeans and knit cap pulled down tightly over chin-length hair, she could be mistaken for a college student. She jokes about her youthful experience, considering her history. "I should be tore up from the floor up with the life that I've led," she says.

Though her past gives her credibility with trafficked women, Lazenko says getting them to walk away is difficult. "We're often working against years of abuse," she says. "When these girls buy into their lives, their minds are made up. The rescue mentality really doesn't work. They don't even consider themselves victims."

It's sometimes hard, too, to convince the police the women are being coerced, Lazenko says.

She maintains that the overwhelming majority of women working as prostitutes in the oil patch are controlled by pimps. She points to one woman she helped who, she says, was beaten by her pimp when she wasn't meeting her $1,000-a-day quota. "That's human trafficking," she says. "That's not prostitution."

The police skepticism, Lazenko says, extends to her.

"They think I'm some kind of wounded warrior who wants to come in and make peace with my past by doing this work," she says. "They don't understand I kind of know what I'm doing."

U.S. Attorney Tim Purdon, though, calls Lazenko "the real deal" and says she's made a huge difference in tackling sex trafficking. He notes that she provided critical emotional support to a woman whose testimony was essential in taking down a man who later pleaded guilty to enticing two women to travel to North Dakota to work as prostitutes.

"She's very calm, and you don't have to be a rocket scientist to know that she can relate to these victims," Purdon says. "She doesn't give up on these women. This can be frustrating work, I'm sure. She's been down this road and knows it's a long march to get out."

Minot Police Capt. Dan Strandberg, who recently worked with Lazenko on a sex sting that led to 13 arrests, calls her "passionate. ... She's got an insight into a world that most people don't."

Lazenko's own story begins with a troubled childhood in California. By her own account, she was sexually abused as a child and at age 13, she ran away, getting involved with people who trafficked her. By 16, she was married to a man a dozen years older. By 19, she was a mother.

What followed was a life of sexual exploitation, she says, including three years as a strip club dancer. She quit one day when she took the stage and had an epiphany. "I knew I didn't belong there," Lazenko says. "I grabbed my stuff and walked out." By then she was 32, and began noticing co-workers her age were quitting and rebuilding their lives.

"It wasn't a quick fix," Lazenko says, and it took years — and a newfound religious faith — to get on track.

Lazenko still has regrets about her past. "I would go the grocery store in my stripper shoes with my kids ... with T-shirts on that said 'Porn Star.' I had no shame," she says. "When I look back on that, it makes me sick to my stomach."

That life damaged her relationship with her five kids, now 18 to 28.

"It's a miracle that things are working out the way that they are," Lazenko says. "It's not perfect. ... It's not like, Poof! My kids forgive me ... They suffered a lot because of the things that had happened in my life, choices I made. I'm not going to say I was a victim 100 percent of the time ... but slowly but surely, my kids are coming around and I'm just so grateful."

While knowing she can't make up for lost years, she's warmed to her new family role. "I may have sucked as a mom, but I rock as a grandma," she says with a laugh.

One of Lazenko's goals is to establish a 30-day emergency shelter for trafficking victims. Domestic violence shelters in the state are crowded and don't have staff trained to deal with sexually exploited women, she says.

Meanwhile, Lazenko continues to encourage them there is a way out.

"I tell them that they were created for more than this, that they have value and talents and they deserve a better life," she says. "There's hope, there's hope. It's just a reminder for me too, that even on the bad days, there is hope."

___

Sharon Cohen, a Chicago-based national writer, can be reached at scohen@ap.org.

This article was written by Sharon Cohen from The Associated Press and was legally licensed through the NewsCred publisher network.

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NOW WATCH: 14 things you didn't know your iPhone headphones could do

North Dakota has seen an increase in demand for prostitution as more and more people flock to the state's burgeoning oil region. Most of these oil workers arrested for solicitation are unaware that many of these women are victims of sex trafficking. 

Produced by Jason Gaines. Video courtesy of Associated Press.

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A sergeant in the US Army who had been charged with helping to prevent sexual assaults in his battalion recently pleaded guilty to hatching a plot to run a prostitution ring from the Fort Hood military post in Killeen, Texas.

The Daily Beast has a rundown of how it happened.

Sgt. 1st Class Gregory McQueen was part of the US Army’s Sexual Harassment and Assault Response/Prevention (SHARP) unit at Fort Hood. At the same time, he was trying to get a prostitution ring off the ground.

He didn't get far. Investigators caught on to what he was doing before he could get the pimping operation up and running. But many at Fort Hood and in the Army were shocked by the allegations, the San Antonio Express-News reports.

McQueen reportedly planned "sex parties" for high-ranking officers at Fort Hood and recruited subordinate female soldiers to the fledgling prostitution ring.

He pleaded guilty to 15 of 21 charges against him and has been sentenced to two years in prison.

Here are some of the accusations against McQueen, as reported in The Daily Beast:

• McQueen reportedly tried to recruit one Army private by telling her he could make "easy money" by letting him pimp her out to higher-ups at Fort Hood. He reportedly took naked photographs of her to show to potential clients.
• This woman, referred to as "Jane," was reportedly paid to have sex with a military higher-up at a hotel after McQueen recruited her. She then reportedly helped McQueen recruit other women from Fort Hood to his sex party operation.
• McQueen reportedly organized Fort Hood sex parties with married women in the military before he decided he wanted to graduate to more blatant pimping. Investigators found text messages McQueen sent to one married woman at Fort Hood to organize a "gang bang." He insisted that no photos be taken because the men were seniors in the military.
• McQueen reportedly invited another female private, who he knew had been sexually assaulted by a sergeant a year before, to one of his wild sex parties. McQueen reportedly told her that there was an interview process to be let in to the parties, and said she'd have to "meet somebody who attends these parties and she’ll be able to tell if you’re cool to come."
• The potential recruit then met "Jane" to talk about attending the parties. When she seemed hesitant, McQueen reportedly tried to ply her with alcohol to "loosen her up." He then allegedly tried to come onto her, but she resisted his advances.
• McQueen reportedly told a recruiter who worked at Fort Hood that he had "a female that will do anything you want for $75."

In his position within Fort Hood's sexual-assault-prevention program, McQueen was reportedly described as "inadequate" and "did not seem to care about the mission of training Soldiers on SHARP issues."

Read the full story at The Daily Beast >>

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Drug Enforcement Administration agents allegedly had "sex parties" with prostitutes hired by drug cartels, according to an inspector general report released Thursday by the Justice Department.

"The foreign officer allegedly arranged 'sex parties' with prostitutes funded by the local drug cartels for these DEA agents at their government-leased quarters, over a period of several years," the report said.

According to Politico, the alleged "sex parties" took place in Colombia between 2005 and 2008. The report didn't appear to name the agents involved, but seven of them admitted to attending the parties and were punished with short suspensions.

The report accused the agents of creating "security risks" by allowing the prostitute parties to occur around sensitive government equipment. (According to complaints, the parties were "loud.")

"In particular, the Inspector said that she explained to [Office of Professional Responsibility] management that the fact that most of the 'sex parties' occurred in government-leased quarters where agents' laptops, BlackBerry devices, and other government-issued equipment were present created potential security risks for the DEA and for the agents who participated in the parties, potentially exposing them to extortion, blackmail, or coercion," the report said.

The agents involved "should have known" the parties were funded by the drug cartels, the report said.

"Although some of the DEA agents participating in these parties denied it, the information in the case file suggested they should have known the prostitutes in attendance were paid with cartel funds. A foreign officer also alleged providing protection for the DEA agents' weapons and property during the parties," it said. "The foreign officers further alleged that in addition to soliciting prostitutes, three DEA SSAs [special agents] in particular were provided money, expensive gifts, and weapons from drug cartel members."

Other troubling allegations were also detailed in the inspector general report. In another case involving prostitutes, DEA agents frequently attended a brother, and a prostitute was allegedly assaulted after a payment disagreement.

"We found that a Regional Director, an Acting Assistant Regional Director (AARD), and a Group Supervisor failed to report ... repeated allegations of DEA Special Agents (SA) patronizing prostitutes and frequenting a brothel while in an overseas posting, treating these allegations as local management issues," the report said. "It was also alleged that one of the subjects in the supervisors’ group assaulted a prostitute following a payment dispute."

The allegations were part of a broader investigation into how the Justice Department's law-enforcement agencies handle allegations of sexual harassment and misconduct. The report found issues with other agencies besides the DEA, including the FBI and US Marshals Service.

One FBI manager was faulted for failing to report one of his employee's repeated unprofessional behavior, including cornering his subordinates in their cubicles and displaying the size of his genitals by tightening his pants, making graphic and inappropriate sexual comments and gestures, and otherwise creating a hostile work environment."

In another case, a supervisor reported allegations that a deputy US Marshall "had an inappropriate relationship with the common law spouse of a fugitive." Three supervisors instructed the US marshal to "terminate the relationship" but he nevertheless pursued it for about a year and the relationship was not reported to the Office of Professional Responsibility.

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives also had issues of sexual misconduct.

"In November 2009, an ATF Director of Industry Operations (DIO) who holds a Top Secret security clearance was on temporary assignment," the report recalled. "According to the ... investigation, the DIO solicited consensual sex with anonymous partners and modified a hotel room door to facilitate sexual play. In addition, the DIO removed smoke detectors from the hotel room and inadvertently caused damage to the hotel’s centralized fire detection system."

The inspector general said the investigation was incomplete, however, because the DEA and the FBI were not fully cooperative.

View the full report below:

This post was continuously updated until 11:32 a.m.

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NOW WATCH: Putin's $51 billion Sochi plan blew up in his face

A new Justice Department investigation revealed a series of shocking allegations of sexual misconduct by agency employees on Thursday. 

These allegations include "sex parties" funded by drug cartels, outlandish and fetishistic sex while on the job, extreme acts of sexual harassment against female subordinates, and much more. 

The accusations are the result of an inspector general's investigation into the sexual harassment and misconduct policies of four Justice Department law-enforcement agencies: the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), US Marshals Service, Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF).

Business Insider rounded up some of the wildest allegations from the report below. These incidents were cited in the report because they were not properly handled by the respective agencies. Many of the offenders were allowed to continue their offensive behavior even after it was reported. 

Sex with a fugitive's wife?

According to the report, a US marshall supervisor learned that a deputy had an "inappropriate" and "romantic" relationship with the spouse of a fugitive. Even after three supervisors instructed the deputy marshall to end the relationship, he nevertheless "continued to pursue it" for another year.

The Office of Professional Responsibility apparently only found out about the relationship after it was terminated: "When the relationship ended, the fugitive’s spouse lodged a complaint." 

'Sex with anonymous partners' on the job

In one particularly bizarre 2009 account, an ATF director apparently went through great lengths to facilitate sexual encounters while on assignment. According to the report, he "solicited consensual sex with anonymous partners and modified a hotel room door to facilitate sexual play."

In addition, the director "removed smoke detectors from the hotel room and inadvertently caused damage to the hotel's centralized fire detection system." After being confronted, he admitted it "was not an isolated incident for him and had occurred in the past." 

It appears the cited ATF director is likely Russell Vanderwerf, who held the same title and was reportedly involved in a similar incident at the time identified in the inspector general's report. Here's how the New Orleans The Times-Picayune described his hotel room modifications: 

But the staffers and a deputy sheriff also discovered that someone had removed the bedroom door from its hinges and replaced it with a 5-by-4-foot piece of plywood affixed to the frame and the drywall with hinges and screws, the arrest report said. The door had two locks attached from the bedroom side and a circular hole padded with duct tape. The deputy noted in the arrest report that the hole appeared to be used "in some sort of sexual act."

'Sex parties' funded by drug cartels

In one of the most headline-grabbing allegations in the report, Drug Enforcement Agency employees admitted to attending "sex parties" with prostitutes paid by drug cartels. What's more, these allegedly "loud" parties happened on government property, creating "security risks." 

Politico reported that these activities took place in Colombia. 

"In particular, the Inspector said that she explained to [Office of Professional Responsibility] management that the fact that most of the 'sex parties' occurred in government-leased quarters where agents' laptops, BlackBerry devices, and other government-issued equipment were present [and] created potential security risks for the DEA and for the agents who participated in the parties, potentially exposing them to extortion, blackmail, or coercion," the report said.

The prostitute receptionist 

A Deputy US marshall conducting an extradition in Bangkok, Thailand, allegedly got involved with some local prostitutes. The situation got a little weird when they started talking to the federal government on his behalf. 

Each time the State Department called the marshall, "two women with heavy foreign accents answered the phone and stated the [marshall] could not be disturbed. A local investigator for the State Department spoke to one of the women in Thai [and] confirmed she was a prostitute." 

The ATF love triangle 

An ATF supervisor failed to report his or her "inappropriate relationship" with an assistant, which involved an "intentional misuse of government vehicles to facilitate that relationship." The supervisor was married and his or her spouse, who was also an ATF employee, found out about the romantic entanglement and "insisted" it be reported to management. 

An overseas porn ask

A DEA assistant regional director allegedly made "numerous inappropriate sexual comments" to his assistant while stationed in another country, including a request "to watch pornographic movies" together. The person also "routinely threw items, yelled at employees, and used other vulgarities in the office and at official functions, among other allegations." 

'Tightening his pants'

An FBI supervisor "repeated unprofessional behavior, including cornering his subordinates in their cubicles and displaying the size of his genitals by tightening his pants, making graphic and inappropriate sexual comments and gestures, and otherwise creating a hostile work environment."

Instead of reporting his behavior, however, the supervisor was repeatedly told to cut it out. "Accordingly, the subordinates experienced the [supervisor's] misconduct for approximately 3 years before it was reported to headquarters," the report said.

Updated (2:24 p.m.): With additional information about the ATF hotel room incident. 

SEE ALSO: DEA agents allegedly had 'sex parties' with prostitutes hired by drug cartels

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NOW WATCH: A lawyer in Florida has come up with an ingenious way for drivers to evade drunken-driving checkpoints

Leonard Glenn Francis, aka “Fat Leonard,” is at the center of a scandal that has plagued the Navy for years.

Fat Leonard was the CEO of Glenn Defense Marine Asia, or GDMA, a Singapore-based supplier of maritime services and naval logistics. GDMA is a husbanding agent, which manages such sundry services as arranging for tugs, docking, fuel, and supplies for the Navy when it visits a foreign port. Leonard was arrested in San Diego in November 2013.

SEE ALSO: Military dolphins help defend the world's largest stockpile of nuclear weapons

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NOW WATCH: A lawyer in Florida has come up with an ingenious way for drivers to evade drunken-driving checkpoints

(Reuters) - A brothel in Nevada has offered to host U.S. Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid's retirement party to thank him for efforts during his more than three decades in the U.S. Congress it says have "positively affected" the lives of legal sex workers in the state.

Sheri's Ranch, located 60 miles west of Las Vegas, posted a tongue-in-cheek open letter on its blog on Wednesday citing the 75-year-old Democrat’s support for gay rights, his opposition to a nearby nuclear waste repository and his efforts on behalf of Obamacare.

“Thank you for making it illegal for insurance companies to deny Nevada's legal hookers the right to health care,” said the letter, which went on to tout the many benefits of the brothel as a party site, including a “beautiful 20 acre property with a hotel and restaurant on-site.

“As far as activities that we can offer attendees, many of your colleagues are intimately aware of our offerings,” the letter added, before listing some options available to patrons.

A brothel representative did not immediately respond to a request for comment. But a ranch spokesman told the Pahrump Valley Times that it was extending the offer despite Reid's longstanding criticism of legal prostitution in Nevada.

“We realized he actually did more good to Nevada’s brothel industry than ill, over the course of his political career," Sheri's Ranch spokesman Jeremy Lemur told the paper. "His actions have actually improved the lives of Nevada brothel workers.”

Prostitution is legal in many mostly rural Nevada counties in regulated and licensed brothels, although sex work is outlawed in Clark County, which includes Las Vegas, as well as in the state capital.

A spokesman for Reid did not immediately return a message seeking comment on the brothel's letter.

Reid, who recently suffered an accident while exercising, said in a video message last week he would not seek re-election next year, and threw his weight behind New York Senator Chuck Schumer to replace him as leader after he leaves office.

"The job of minority leader of the United States Senate is just as important as being the majority leader," Reid said in the video. "It gives you so much opportunity to do good things for this country. And that's what I am focused on."

(Editing by Cynthia Johnston and Dan Grebler)

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The Department of Justice is fed up with its employees soliciting prostitutes.

In a new all-staff memo issued on Friday, Attorney General Eric Holder warned that such behavior could lead to being fired. 

"The Department of Justice is measured by the conduct of those who work on its behalf. The solicitation of prostitution threatens the core mission of the Department, not simply because it invites extortion, blackmail, and leaks of sensitive or classified information, but also because it undermines the Department's efforts to eradicate the scourge of human trafficking," Holder wrote in the memo, which was published by The Washington Post.

The memo comes in the aftermath of a series of embarrassing scandals involving Justice Department employees soliciting prostitutes on the job. A blockbuster inspector general report revealed in March that Drug Enforcement Administration officials allegedly had "sex parties" funded by drug cartels, and a deputy US marshall once had two Thai prostitutes answer his State Department calls. 

Holder said the prostitution ban even extends to countries where it's legal. 

"Regardless of whether prostitution is legal or tolerated in a particular jurisdiction, soliciting prostitutes creates a greater demand for human trafficking victims and a consequent increase in the number of minor and adult persons trafficked into commercial sex slavery," he wrote.

The inspector general report also accused supervisors of repeatedly failing to take action when their staff members were caught in alleged sexual misconduct. Holder's letter also put these supervisors on notice.

"Supervisors and managers are subject to discipline for failing to report suspected violations. Suspected violations by Department employees must be immediately reported to the internal affairs personnel of the relevant component's headquarters," he wrote.

View Holder's letter below:

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NOW WATCH: Animated map of what Earth would look like if all the ice melted

U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agents in Colombia were taking part in alleged sex parties with prostitutes funded by drug cartels years earlier than previously known, U.S. lawmakers said on Tuesday.

Several DEA agents were taking part in these parties in Bogota as early as 2001, said a summary of a DEA report released by the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform at a hearing on the misconduct.

"This new internal report describes not one or two isolated incidents, but literally dozens of parties with prostitutes," Democratic Representative Elijah Cummings said at the hearing, where lawmakers grilled DEA Administrator Michele Leonhart.

The hearing came on the heels of a separate March 26 report by the Justice Department's Office of the Inspector General that described similar allegations between 2005 and 2008.

That report said 10 agents - an assistant regional director and nine special agents - had alleged sex parties on government-leased property and used taxpayer money to pay for the prostitutes. Three of the agents got money, gifts and weapons from drug cartel members, according to the earlier report.

After investigation, seven of the DEA agents admitted attending the parties and were suspended for between two and 10 days.

"I don't believe that the discipline doled out in those cases is even close to what it should be," said Leonhart in testimony before the committee.

She added that, under U.S. civil service rules, she could not fire, revoke security clearances or recommend penalties for the agents. Two senior officials in the agency were tasked with discipline, she said.

The DEA allegations came in the wake of a prostitution scandal involving Secret Service agents in Cartagena,Colombia, in 2012 that damaged that agency's straitlaced reputation.

In another DEA-related case, Keenya Meshell Banks, a former DEA program manager, pleaded guilty on Tuesday in Maryland to submitting dozens of fake credit card applications for fictitious DEA employees, defrauding the U.S. government of $113,000, the U.S. Justice Department said in a statement.

(Editing by Kevin Drawbaugh, Andrew Hay and Ted Botha)

SEE ALSO: The 7 naughtiest stories from the blockbuster Justice Department 'sex party' report

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