hot document: Primary sources exposed and explained.

The D.C. Madam's Phone Records

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from: Bonnie Goldstein

Posted Tuesday, May 1, 2007, at 7:42 PM ET

Deborah Jeanne Palfrey is currently the subject of a criminal indictment alleging prostitution. Between 1993 and 2006 she ran an escort service in the District of Columbia. According to Palfrey, "contractors" to her firm, Pamela Martin & Associates, agreed in writing to refrain from sexual acts "prohibited by law." Palfrey even sued one such contractor for $75,000 because she "breached her contract" by engaging in illegal sexual activities while on the job. Imagine that!

When her legal troubles began, Palfrey hoped her powerful and influential johns—ahem, customers—would step forward to confirm that Palfrey's contractors did not provide sex for money. No one did. Then Palfrey threatened to sell her phone records, which would allow anyone with a reverse phone directory to identify the people she spoke to on a regular basis, most of whom were likely clients. The court stopped her. Finally Palfrey turned over free of charge to ABC News correspondent Brian Ross (who late last year broke the congressional-page story that prompted the resignation of Rep. Mark Foley, R.-Fla.) 46 pounds of phone records. Late last month Ross and his producers identified one of Palfrey's clients as Randall Tobias, who as deputy secretary of state ran U.S. foreign aid programs (and, ironically, was the Bush administration's leading advocate for abstinence-oriented programs abroad). Tobias promptly resigned, claiming he'd received "no sex" and that he had merely called Palfrey's service "to have gals come over to the condo to give me a massage."

ABC has the most recent phone records, but Palfrey has thoughfully posted online a sample page from her August 1996 Sprint long-distance bill. Recognize any of these phone numbers?

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hot document
entries
1
from: Bonnie Goldstein

Posted Tuesday, May 1, 2007, at 7:42 PM ET
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Bonnie Goldstein is a former special investigator to the U.S. Senate and investigative producer for ABC News.
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