Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, December 2, 1993 TAG: 9312020220
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: RON BROWN STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
\ Roseanne is new to the streetwalker game.
As she stands on the Southeast Roanoke street corner in a miniskirt and sweater picked out by her husband, she's stunned at how many men are out cruising for sex.
"I'm amazed that so many people stopped and circled so many times," she said.
What amazes the men is that Roseanne is not a streetwalker at all. She's a Roanoke police officer working undercover.
Because of her work, she asks that her real name not be used.
Police say women police officers will keep working the streets, until they get the problem under control. It's not the first time that a woman police officer has been asked to pose as a prostitute. It won't be the last.
Police say prostitution and the problems it creates are ongoing.
Roseanne brings to her new job the same philosophy that led her to become a police officer in the first place.
"When I got into this job, I tried to serve and protect," she said. "I'm trying to protect these guys from themselves."
She knows that in the era of AIDS, sex with a stranger can mean death.
Life on the street corner, she learns, is not a very lonely one. Her longest wait is 10 minutes before some man pulls alongside her in an attempt to buy sex.
The men arrive in bitter cold and even in a driving rainstorm, as she stands beneath a large golf umbrella. One man has asked a cab driver to take him to a prostitute. Police arrest the man - and the cab driver.
"Some would do a little small talk and then get around to what they wanted," she said. "Some would just go `boom,' and that was it."
Some expose themselves as they pull along the curbside.
Some of the regular prostitutes show up while she is working. Recognizing the futility of standing on the street corners as the vice squad looks on, they leave willingly.
The men keep arriving.
"The same people I would see at 3 o'clock in the afternoon, I would see at 3 a.m.," Roseanne said.
Eighty people were charged with soliciting prostitution in three separate stings over the past several months. Sometimes, the customer traffic was so heavy that Roseanne was pulled off the street until other officers could catch up on the arrest paperwork.
Those who are convicted for the first time receive a $250 fine and a suspended jail sentence. Second-time offenders can lose their car under state law.
One man told another female police officer that he was lonely and only wanted someone to accompany him to dinner. He was willing to pay $200, but since he didn't ask for sex, no charges were filed against him.
There were also the hardcore customers who thought any woman along the curb around 3rd Street and Campbell Avenue Southeast was looking for sex.
Police became involved in the sting after downtown businesses complained that their female employees were being accosted as they walked to their cars in the afternoon.
Police say that even after the sting, the lure of sidewalk sex keeps the customers coming. Last week, nine prostitutes were arrested as they stood on street corners.
Roseanne's family, her husband in particular, worried about her safety. Still, she said, he had faith in her and the officers backing her up.
"The idea was to have her dressed nicely, but not in a provocative outfit" said Lt. B.S. Lugar, who heads the Police Department's vice squad.
The game plan was for her to get enough evidence to get a conviction without unduly tempting the men to engage her for sex.
"Most seemed to be nice men," Roseanne said. "Some were businessmen with families."
Beyond the cosmetics, a successful vice officer must be able to play the role, while paying strict attention to the details that make up a good solicitation case.
Not all police officers can do it.
"We had some up here that couldn't play the roles," Lugar said. "They were better-suited for patrol."
Playing that double duty is what keeps the job interesting, Roseanne said.
"We've got to be like the bad guys to catch the bad guys," she said.
But she knows that play-acting with bad guys had its own inherent danger.
She always had backup and never got into a car with a man alone.
"There's always that element of fear," she said. "I'll try to keep that. That's what keeps me and my partners alive."
by CNB