The Washington Post
December 5, 2013
Authorities are investigating whether a veteran D.C. police officer was running a prostitution ring out of his Southeast Washington apartment, where they found a 16-year-old girl who had been reported missing, according to documents unsealed in federal court. The officer, who has been on the force 24 years, had not been arrested as of Thursday evening, but he was put on paid administrative leave as police continued their investigation. The teenager told police that the officer took nude photos of her and arranged for her to have sex for money, the court papers say.News of the allegation broke publicly as another D.C. police officer was in U.S. District Court facing a federal charge of producing child pornography. Marc L. Washington, 32, was arrested Monday on allegations that he took pictures of a semi-nude 15-year-old who had run away from home.
Officers stayed at the apartment through the night and most of Wednesday, and after getting a search warrant, they confiscated nine pairs of shoes, one bra, two boxes of condoms, computers and cellphones. The court documents stated that they also took a mirror with names written on it and that the 16-year-old told police that the names were of women who had worked as prostitutes.
A high-ranking D.C. police official said authorities are still sorting through conflicting statements and trying to determine precisely what was happening in the apartment. How the officer met the girl was not described in documents made public thus far.
According to court documents, the girl told police that she had gone to the officer’s apartment at least twice and that the officer took nude photos of her wearing sparkly high-heeled shoes and showed them to a potential customer. The man liked the photos, and was scheduled to meet her and pay $80 for sex, the girl told police. Of that, she said, $20 was to go to the officer. The girl said that the officer was to pay for her hairstyle, shoes and new clothes, and that her working name would be “Juicy.” It was not clear whether the girl ever met the customer.
The girl said that six other women worked out of the apartment and that advertisements were posted on the Internet site backpage.com, the documents said.