Escort services and prostitution

Factual Questions
1

Doubtless some of these services are thinly disguised call girl operations, and doubtless the vice cops keep their eyes open for signs that a supposedly legit business is a front for illegal activity. My question was whether the following could be legally considered prostitution, and whether the authorities could do anything about it if it were.

Let’s say that Divine Goddess Escorts tells both their employees and their customers that there is no quid pro quo: the women are under no obligation to provide sex, will be fired and/or prosecuted if they solicit their customers, and the men have no right to expect or solicit sex. However, the escorts who “choose” to have sex with their customers will not suprisingly get a lot of repeat business, while those who don’t will get less. After a while the escort service notes which women are “popular” and which aren’t. The ones that aren’t are let go, while the ones who prove “popular” get a hefty raise, supposedly for remaining with the service after x months.

In other words, can the escort service just somehow end up rewarding sex between their escorts and well-paying customers, without technically falling afoul of the prostitution laws? Sort of the way that insurance companies insist that all valid claims be payed out, but promote managers whose divisions “just somehow” :rolleyes: pay out fewer claims than the company average? Do most legit escort services explicitly ban any sexual contact with a client, to avoid this?

2

For some reason prostitution laws are very popular in the “let’s think of a way around it” game. Another example of this I heard (probably on this board) was a business that sold condoms (and that’s it! really!) for $200 each . . .

The thing is that the law is not a formulaic set of rules in a dusty book somewhere. If someone that runs such a business gets prosecuted for prostitution, they will have to appear before a real live judge who will not be constrained by “the letter of the law” so to speak. So, if the end result is someone pays for sex, prostitution has occurred.

3

Not answering the question, but maybe adding to it indirectly… it was my impression that escort services, by and large, are basically for prostitution. Of course there’s no guarantee of it, and the service cannot promise it and wouldn’t hook you up if you ask, but isn’t that the point of them?

4

Even real live judges are constrained by the letter of the law.

A judge has some latitude when it comes to reducing or dismissing charges, but very little when it comes to applying them beyond the statute.

5

Ok, here we go with the standard disclaimers: by responding to the questions posed in this thread, I am not offering anybody legal advice. If anyone’s interest in this subject is based on anything other than idle curiosity, you should consult a lawyer licensed in your jurisdiction. I am not your lawyer. You are not my client.

Furthermore, I am not a criminal lawyer, and I don’t know much about criminal law but here goes.

Generally speaking to be convicted of a crime the prosecution must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that you had the requisite intent (the latin term is “mens rea”). This is a question of fact for the jury. Your statements about your intent, your statements at the time, your explanation of why you did what you did, these are all evidence, but none of them are dispositive.

Take another hypothetical. Say you go to a known violent criminal and you say to him, “you know, you seem like a really good guy. In fact, you are such a good guy, that next week, I think I’m going to give you $50,000.” And then you say “and you know what else. I really hate my neighbor. Boy, I’ll tell you something. If my neighbor were to somehow, oh, I don’t know, disappear, let’s say. That would be great. in fact, that would be beyond great. Boy would that make me happy.”

Then the thug goes and kills your neighbor. Are you guilty of conspiring to kill your neighbor? Of course you are. Any reasonable person looking at that conversation and the sequence of events would reach the inescapable conclusion that you had hired this person to kill your neighbor. If you later tried to say no no no, that was all just a misunderstanding, no one would take you seriously.

So, now let’s go back to your prostitution, sorry, escort example. You’re not paying for sex, you see. You’re just paying for the, uh, well, just the conversation. yeah, that’s it.

Well, it’s going to come down to what the jury determines (or the judge if it is a bench trial). For what it’s worth I actually read recently that a suprising number of john’s go to escorts just to talk and not for sex at all (as in, they don’t have sex.)

6

What about having a video camera on the whole time and just claiming you’re making porn?

7

Strangely enough in the UK paying for sex isn’t actually a crime, in that if someone has sex with another person and money is involved (i.e. prostitution has occured) there is no crime. However soliciting for sex and seeking to pay for it are, so whilst the act isn’t criminalised the process is.

In that context if someone is paying for a legitimate service, an escort (yes it really is a legitimate service), and then in the course of that there is an agreement to have sex and money exchanges hands then no crime has occured.

8

I had a friend who was quite fond of the ladies of the evening. When he contacted an escort he always explained that he wanted a private lap dance in his home. He claimed to enjoy the strip club fantasy, but hated having all the other people around.

He always figured he could go in front of a judge and say that he was only paying for the private dance. He would argue that if countless men will spend 20 or even 40 dollars for a few minutes of tease in a crowded, noisy, strip club than isn’t 200 dollars a reasonable price for an hour of tease in his own home?

9

What **constantine **said. Here’s a case: http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=or&vol=a102715&invol=1 (defendant denied knowledge that escorts were engaged in prostitution; at trial in 1997 court upheld introduction of 1994 statement to police that it was “possible, but unlikely” that escorts in her employ engaged in prostitution; conviction upheld).

10

I think that’s because it’s kind of an odd thing to have against the law in the first place. It’s weird to make something illegal to sell, but legal to give away for free. I think that situation lends itself to people trying to work the system.

11

What we are talking about here is obeying the letter of the law while defeating the spirit of it, this is a good way to piss off a judge. Invariably they will find against you in some way and you will spend time in jail. Trying to out lawyer the lawyers rarely ends in any positive result for the lay person.

12

Even odder: consider the fact that in many jurisdictions, solicitation for sodomy - no money involved - was a serious misdemeanor or even a felony – an attempt to crack down on gay “cruising” of parks etc.

Solicitation for prostitution was a less serious misdemeanor. So we have the odd circumstance that adding an element to the offense makes it a lesser offense.

“He solicited me for free sex, Your Honor.”

“That’s a filthy lie! I offered to pay!”

13

On the radio once, when I was a kid, I heard a morning show interview with a call girl. I remember her saying that most escorts didn’t do sex. The DJs were shocked. She said that her clientelle are mostly businessmen in town for the evening and need someone to take to a business dinner, or to a fancy ball when their wife isn’t available. She said the main purpose of an escort isn’t to provide sex, but to make a guy look good so he can get that merger sewed up or make the ex jealous. I can believe that.