Parsing the Affidavit: Late Payments and Haggling Appear to Have Done Spitzer In
Whether she meant an interest in asphyxiation or some other violent activity, or whether simply that he preferred to take his prostitutes without a condom is something the world may never know, especially if Spitzer manages to keep himself out of court by having his lawyers use his very public humiliation and his forced resignation as chits in a plea bargain.
The world also knows that Spitzer was not just a happenstance catch, a john that federal agents were surprised to hear themselves listening to over their headphones in the back of their proverbial white van. On the contrary, Spitzer seems to have been the key that opened the floodgates: massive withdrawals of cash from his personal bank account got people interested in what the governor might be putting $4,300 toward at a time on close to 10 encounters over the past few years. Not bribery and blackmail, they discovered. Just hookers.
But the striking thing about the wiretap which ensnared
Spitzer and seems poised to be the nail in the coffin of his once-ascendant
political career is that the evidence against him might not have been obtained
if he had simply paid his bills promptly and accepted the terms laid down by
the prostitution ring. Client 9 apparently has only himself and the slow pace
of the
According to the conversations captured on the wiretap and filed in the affidavit, Client 9 had problems getting his payment in on time. The Emperors Club apparently required payment in advance and preferred payments be delivered by wire transfer. Expenses were rung up to companies named with variations of QAT, so that they would appear as legitimate business expenses, the company assured their clients.
Client 9, however, declined this method. Savvy, it seems, to how wire transfers can be traced, he insisted on delivering his payments in cash by mail. And so he apparently stuffed wads of bills into stamped envelopes, requiring those withdrawals which alerted the authorities in the first place.
The cash got the authorities interested. The delivery method got the prostitution ring furious.
And all because the mail was slow in early February, when Spitzer was trying to set up his now famous encounter in Room 871 of the Mayflower Hotel.
This set off a chain of 15 phone calls in total, six
involving Client 9, and seven text messages, none involving him, which provided
the information which helped lead to an indictment, as questions of whether
Client 9 could be trusted to make the payment, and how much, were discussed.
That the prostitute in question was traveling from
And Client 9’s promise to pay for everything “train tickets,
cab fare from the hotel and back, mini bar or room service, travel time, and
hotel,” according to the affidavit, apparently did little to soothe the minds
of the Emperors Club decision makers.
Nor did Client 9’s loyalty as a customer impress them, even
when he pointed out that he had “around $400 or $500 in credit,” though this
was the subject of some discussion. Eventually, the go-between informed Client
9 that “the ‘office’ said he could not proceed with the appointment with his
available credit,” though that would cover the travel expenses to get the
prostitute, known as Kristen, “an American, petite, very pretty brunette, 5
feet 5 inches and 105 pounds,” to his hotel room.
This pushed Client 9 into more negotiations, as they
discussed whether he could give the prostitute some cash directly to bring back
to the service—a practice high-class prostitution businesses generally avoid to
minimize their vulnerability under the law. The Emperors Club employee in
conversation with Client 9 suggested that he “could give ‘Kristen’ ‘extra
funds’ at this appointment in order to avoid payment issues in the future.”
This was unusual, Client 9 was told, but “she was going to make an exception
that way a deposit could be made so that he would have a credit, and they would
not have to ‘go through this’ next time.”
Whether Client 9 would hand over $1,000, $1,500 or $2,000
and whether he could find a bank to get that money was the subject of more
conversations, as was the client’s unwillingness to leave a key for his
prostitute at the front desk. This apparent security precaution not only
initiated even more phone calls and text messages between the people involved,
but left the prostitute waiting in a hotel room for him for several hours. A
conversation between the prostitute and Client 9 to inform her that he would
soon arrive—presumably via a lobby phone—appears to be the only call not
captured on the wiretap.
But after much ado, multiple phone calls wondering whether
Client 9 could be trusted to pay and negotiating over whether he would have
$2,611 in his account or $2,721.41, the appointment between Client 9 and
Kristen apparently finally happened between
And business was discussed as well. According to Kristen,
Client 9, ever thrifty, finished his appointment after just two hours, though
he paid for four, leaving him with credit on his account. Whether he ever had
or tried to make an appointment to take advantage of his savings is not
addressed in the charges.
Nonetheless, the evidence seems enough to possibly indict
Client 9. And more than enough to force him out of office, despite his initial
reluctance to go.
Had Client 9 restricted his dalliance to
