Gallery Carre
Vice Unit’s "Hands On" Tactics for Catching Prostitutes is Rubbing People the Wrong Way: CrimProfs Weigh in
Oct 10th, 2024 by Viviane
From SeattleTimes.com: “Lynnwood police concede they engaged in “rarely used” tactics during an undercover investigation into a suspected prostitution ring. Those tactics, which included officers allowing prostitutes to masturbate them in exchange for cash, have raised questions among law-enforcement officials, legal experts and the Snohomish County Prosecutor’s Office.
Lynnwood police Cmdr. Paul Watkins said he spent a great deal of time justifying the officers’ actions to prosecutors to prove that the officers themselves weren’t breaking the law…The officers didn’t cross that line of engaging in intercourse or oral sex,” Watkins said. “I advised them no oral sex, no intercourse, that’s not going to happen. That’s the understood policy. There’s no written policy regarding this.”
But other law-enforcement officials who weren’t involved in the investigation say allowing officers to engage in such acts, even in an undercover investigation, goes too far. The usual tactic, they say, calls for an arrest once someone agrees to perform a sexual act in exchange for money. Seattle and King County police, for example, do not allow undercover officers to have sexual contact with prostitutes… (more…)