Prosecuting Johns

Former New York Governor Eliot Spitzer resigned in March 2008 after it was discovered that he had used women in prostitution, a violation of New York's comprehensive anti-trafficking law. Last week, we learned that the former prosecutor will not be prosecuted for breaking the law. (Click here for reader response on this story.)

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Mr. Spitzer feels that he has paid for his "sins," as he put it. His description of prostitution as sinful carefully positions the buying of a woman for sexual use within the realm of tawdry scandals rather than the harmful sexual exploitation that it actually is. Although Mr. Spitzer apologized to New Yorkers, his friend, lawyer Alan Dershowitz, has said the governor's use of prostitutes is "no big deal."

U.S. Attorney Michael J. Garcia's decision not to pursue criminal charges against Mr. Spitzer for buying women in prostitution is a stunning betrayal of the public trust. Citing precedent, Mr. Garcia indicated that the Department of Justice (DOJ) does not typically prosecute johns who buy women from pimps, except in cases of prostitution of children. ("In light of the policy of the Department of Justice with respect to prostitution offenses and the longstanding practice of this Office, as well as Mr. Spitzer's acceptance of responsibility for his conduct, we have concluded that the public interest would not be further advanced by filing criminal charges in this matter," he said in a statement.) The DOJ also chose not to charge Mr. Spitzer for transporting a woman across state lines for the purpose of prostitution—a violation of the Mann Act. Congress might be interested to learn that its laws are being effectively nullified by DOJ policy.

Prosecutorial discretion cannot be based on gender bias, nor can it eliminate whole classes of people that the law was designed to protect. By doing so in this instance, the Justice Department has sent a clear message that it is acceptable to buy and sell women for sex; this in the face of growing evidence that prostitution is emotionally and physically harmful to those used in it, and that prostitution and sex trafficking are inextricably linked— prostitution is the endpoint of all sex trafficking.

Prostitution is not a victimless crime. The DOJ policy is out of step with volumes of evidence that prostitution arises out of adverse social conditions such as being sexually abused in childhood, poverty, racism, lack of educational and economic opportunities, disability, and a culture that increasingly commodifies girls. Now we can add to that list a legal system that gives a wink and a nod to wealthy and powerful men who buy women as merchandise for their sexual use.

Even when the pimps are alleged to be running a high-end, high-class call-girl service, they still sell women for sexual use and still take their cut. And those in it, like Ashley Dupré—a young woman whom Mr. Spitzer bought for sex—more often than not, have entered prostitution as a result of long-term abuse, neglect, and economic desperation; a situation that worsens disproportionately for women as the economy declines. Ms. Dupré ran away from what she has described as an abusive home, and her lawyers have confirmed she was filmed by "Girls Gone Wild" founder Joe Francis, who pleaded no contest to child abuse and prostitution charges stemming from his work, when she was 17. Ms. Dupré later met up with the pimps and johns at Emperor's Club VIP in New York, a prostitution ring that sometimes moved women from the United States to Europe on what they called "travel dates" rather than human trafficking.