View Full Version : What’s a NFL Billionaire Doing Here?.....
whirlerz
09-07-2020, 04:01 PM
Whatever happened to this guy?
Probably nothing right
slowpoke
09-07-2020, 05:56 PM
Prosecutors appeal decision suppressing video in Patriots owner Robert Kraft's prostitution case
Story dateline is June 30
Will Robert Kraft case end up protecting others' privacy? 06:31
(CNN)Florida prosecutors pushed a state appeals court on Tuesday to overturn last year's decision suppressing video of New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft inside a massage parlor.
The appeal stems from the criminal case against Kraft, 78, who was charged with two misdemeanor counts of soliciting prostitution in February 2019. The powerful NFL owner was one of dozens of spa patrons allegedly caught on secret cameras receiving illicit massages at the spa in January 2019.
Kraft's attorneys challenged the validity of the search warrant that let authorities install hidden cameras inside the spa, saying it violated his Fourth Amendment rights and Florida law. A Palm Beach County judge agreed in May 2019 and ruled to suppress the video, effectively gutting the criminal case against him.
On Tuesday, Florida Deputy Solicitor General Jeffrey DeSousa asked the West Palm Beach Florida's Fourth District Court of Appeal to reverse that decision and defended the search warrant.
Full story
https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/30/us/robert-kraft-prostitution-video/index.html
rickdugan
09-08-2020, 04:39 AM
^ Kraft won the appeal. The appeal court found the use of "sneak and peak" warrants in this instance to be extreme and in violation of the defendants' rights.
https://abcnews.go.com/US/florida-appeals-court-agrees-throw-video-evidence-prostitution/story?id=72475722
It was the right decision. If police can do this, they can put cameras in pretty much any private setting for any nickel and dime crime. None of us should want to live in a police state.
eagle2
09-08-2020, 02:46 PM
It looks like it was a state court, so the ruling only applies to Florida.
rickdugan
09-08-2020, 03:20 PM
It looks like it was a state court, so the ruling only applies to Florida.
True but it's a good start, especially for someone like me living in FL. ;D
With that said, I have to imagine that judges in other states are taking notice and potentially rethinking the conditions under which they approve sneak and peek warrants. I am also very much hoping that they keep appealing, with the next stops being the FL Supreme Court and then the U.S. Supreme Court so that we can get a national application.
slowpoke
09-08-2020, 03:50 PM
According to the story it is a decision by an intermediate state court, which has jurisdiction over cases arriving in certain counties. According to Wikipedia
“The Florida Fourth District Court of Appeal is headquartered in West Palm Beach, Florida. Its twelve judges have jurisdiction over cases arising in Palm Beach County, Broward County, St. Lucie County, Martin County, Indian River County, and Okeechobee County.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florida_Fourth_District_Court_of_Appeal
The ruling may have persuasive value in the rest of the state, and may (or may not) be subject to appeal.
“The right to a single appeal to one of the District Courts of Appeal is guaranteed in most circumstances. Further appeals to the Florida Supreme Court are available as matter of right only in limited circumstances (in capital punishment cases, appeal is automatic to the Supreme Court, bypassing the District Court of Appeal). If an appeal to the Supreme Court is not available as a matter of right, a party can still petition for discretionary review, though only a fraction of these petitions are granted. Supreme Court decisions and case law are binding upon all Florida courts. The decisions and case law precedent of each District Court of Appeal are binding upon all circuit and county courts within that district's jurisdiction. Case law and decisions from another District Court of Appeal are persuasive and often cited within the courts of other appellate districts, but are not binding precedent in those other districts unless no other Florida appellate court has addressed the issue in question.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florida_State_Courts_System#District_Courts_of_App eal
whirlerz
09-08-2020, 04:46 PM
I guess I opened up a can of worms
Raziel
09-08-2020, 05:15 PM
I guess I opened up a can of worms
I wouldn't worry about it.
slowpoke
09-08-2020, 06:29 PM
I guess I opened up a can of worms
Or rekindled an interesting discussion!
whirlerz
09-08-2020, 06:43 PM
Haha, I was noticing the 'spas' in my area have opened back up..
Really funny, area's known to be religious, upscale, (but country), literally, a 'spa' in every strip mall around here::)
miss.a.p1600
09-09-2020, 06:19 AM
^yeah that’s what I was thinking when I first learned about this.
Like I can’t understand how spas (the ones that offer more) can get away with operating in the middle of family oriented strip malls.
Florida has some of the most ________(full in blank) people.
My gripe about the incident is that those spas are adult oriented businesses and should be treated and zoned just like any other adult oriented business. If strip clubs n brothels have to be placed in obscure places around the city so should Adult massage parlors.
Also if people think adult massages should be legal then stop voting for politicians who think this should be illegal. These rich people have plenty of money to buy politicians but instead they’d rather buy cheap handjobs and high power attorneys to beat a charge. I guess the latter is more thrilling and benefits themselves.
I still can’t wrap my mind around how law enforcement botched this case. The head of this operation should be fired.
Anyways. That old ancient guy is gross - ain’t he the one kissing Tom Brady in the mouth?
rickdugan
09-09-2020, 06:59 AM
^ I don't disagree with the concept that these places should not be in the same strip malls where people go to shop for groceries. I have 3 kids and I'm fortunate that we live in an area that would simply not tolerate it. No local strip mall developer in his/her right mind would rent out space to an AMP where I live, I can guarantee it.
But with that said, just because something is illegal does not mean that police have unlimited powers in how they pursue it. The police "botched" this simply by using tactics that they were just not supposed to use. All the rich person did in this instance was to hold them accountable for their blatant abuse of power. There were other ways to do this, such as sending in undercover detectives, which is how this is normally done. Those cameras should never have been there and they know it.
While I don't want my kids growing up near an AMP, I also most certainly don't want them growing up in a police state. What's next, SWAT teams for jaywalkers or people driving without seatbelts? Seriously now, there needs to be limits on what the police can do or else we will always need to live in fear of each police encounter.
whirlerz
09-09-2020, 03:11 PM
There was one (it's now gone) right across the street from a school..
I've known of a different one, different area, by a grammar school, it's also gone, but was there for quite a while..
I don't have kids, but I sure wouldn't want that anywhere around a school.
Djoser
09-09-2020, 03:21 PM
My first club was a stripclub in the biggest building in a smaller sized stripmall in Daytona. It got shut down because there was a little dinky 'church' way in the back part. Now it's a huge 'All You Can Eat' Chinese restaurant.
miss.a.p1600
09-09-2020, 09:28 PM
Lol @ “all you can eat”
rickdugan
01-18-2021, 08:25 AM
To close the loop on this, FL prosecutors, after getting walloped by multiple District Courts and then an Appeals Court, finally had no choice but to dismiss the charges:
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/24/sports/football/robert-kraft-video-surveillance-case.html
The good guys won. Let this be a lesson to police forces around the country who think that trampling upon our Constitutional protections is ok. While yes this was primarily a FL issue, other jurisdictions have no doubt taken notice of how police and prosecutors had their asses handed to them in court after court for using video surveillance in this way.
whirlerz
01-18-2021, 07:36 PM
:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:^^!
CFMNH44
01-18-2021, 09:07 PM
Not that they have learned anything or changed. Witness this PR by a FL sheriff in front of a sign spelling his name in 2' high letters.
https://www.tampabay.com/news/hillsborough/2021/01/11/71-arrested-in-hillsborough-prostitution-sting-ahead-of-super-bowl-55/#:~:text=Hillsborough-,71%20arrested%20in%20Hillsborough%20prostitution% 20sting%20ahead%20of%20Super%20Bowl,prostitutes%20 and%20discourage%20human%20traffickers.
miss.a.p1600
01-18-2021, 09:34 PM
No they don’t learn.
I remember that To Catch A Predator show where they set up a sting and some of those guys would get caught more than once.
I think that’s what makes it so exciting ...... the element of danger n risk - if you get away with doing something taboo something illegal .... it’s exhilarating
It defies logic.
But then again when has dick operated on logic? Lol
Raziel
01-19-2021, 02:48 AM
I remember that To Catch A Predator show
I remember that show. I remember one Rabbi that got enraged when he got caught, tried to attack the guy. That show was a whirl. Too bad it's gone.
whirlerz
01-19-2021, 03:34 AM
It's on YouTube, lots of episodes ^.
Chris Hansen.
slowpoke
01-19-2021, 08:03 AM
I was going to ask about this yesterday. Now, will he bring a civil rights suit?
rickdugan
01-19-2021, 08:42 AM
I was going to ask about this yesterday. Now, will he bring a civil rights suit?
If you mean Kraft, I very much doubt it. I'm sure that the last thing he wants to do is rehash all the gory details in another public trial.
He got what he wanted, which is to have the video evidence quashed. It has not been destroyed yet because the ADA is actually being sued for abuse of position and the manager of Jupiter are still being pursued criminally, but I suspect that eventually it will be destroyed via a court order.
The saddest part is that the owner and manager of the spa are still being charged, despite the fact that the video evidence will ultimately not be usable. I suspect that testimony from some of the Johns and all the condoms they found in the garbage are probably enough to get them for running a house of prostitution even without the video. But at least the individual sex workers are off the hook since they can't specifically prove which girl did what.
miss.a.p1600
01-19-2021, 09:13 AM
I was going to ask about this yesterday. Now, will he bring a civil rights suit?
Can he? There was evidence (inadmissible due to prosecutors sloppy collection of said evidence) of him committing a crime (according to the Florida statutes) - he did it n he knows he did it, they know he did it, the woman that topped him off knows it happened.
Im no licensed lawyer but I would think that all it would take is that woman to admit what happened to ruin a plan to counter sue
whirlerz
01-19-2021, 10:27 AM
A raging pandemic that killed 20% of US people, crazies running the asylum, the going to hell in a hand cart, &, worried about some. 000. 1 per center's d*ck, that could basically buy his way out of an on view murder, let alone this circus..
Of course, the venue's gonna be on the hook, who else 's gonna take the heat.. him??
Don't think so! ::)
kamiliam
01-19-2021, 10:45 AM
The saddest part is that the owner and manager of the spa are still being charged, despite the fact that the video evidence will ultimately not be usable. I suspect that testimony from some of the Johns and all the condoms they found in the garbage are probably enough to get them for running a house of prostitution even without the video. But at least the individual sex workers are off the hook since they can't specifically prove which girl did what.
kraft wasn’t going to have real consequences even if convicted, that isn’t the world we live in
but thank you for acknowledging this part of the story. Vice squads just do a whole lot of damage
rickdugan
01-21-2021, 08:20 AM
kraft wasn’t going to have real consequences even if convicted, that isn’t the world we live in
but thank you for acknowledging this part of the story. Vice squads just do a whole lot of damage
Agreed for the most part, except maybe for the consequences to Kraft. If he was actually convicted the NFL could have found a myriad of ways to screw with him under the morals clauses in the league franchise agreement.
But what I don't understand is this never-ending attempt by some on here to frame this as a billionaire getting away with one. This was not a rich vs. poor tale, but rather a story of providers and Johns finally fighting arrogant and self-entitled LE and prosecutors who had become accustomed to abusing the Constitutional rights of regular people just because they could get away with it.
Kraft is the "hero" in this story (if there can be such a thing), not the villain. By fighting this, he protected everyone, including the customers and a number of girls who were recorded. Prosecutors even seized the bank accounts of one of the women who serviced Kraft. That woman is now free and clear, without a record, and presumably has her accounts unfrozen.
So as I said above, the good guys and gals won. I'm just sad that throwing out the video evidence wasn't enough to take the spa owner and manager, both women, out of the jackpot. But Kraft did a tremendous service not only to the girls who were caught on video providing consensual services, but countless women who will come after who will be safe from this type of LE abuse in FL.
miss.a.p1600
01-21-2021, 08:34 AM
kraft wasn’t going to have real consequences even if convicted, that isn’t the world we live in
but thank you for acknowledging this part of the story. Vice squads just do a whole lot of damage
Exactly. There is a “justice” system for the wealthy, and a “justice” system for everyone else.
I guess the $60 hand job ended up costing him probably $90k+ with all the money going to the upper class lawyers
rickdugan
01-21-2021, 08:46 AM
Exactly. There is a “justice” system for the wealthy, and a “justice” system for everyone else.
I guess the $60 hand job ended up costing him probably $90k+ with all the money going to the upper class lawyers
So instead let's give a criminal record to a bunch of girls, and condone illegal recordings by LE, just to be sure that we get the billionaire for paying for a handjob. That'll teach him.
miss.a.p1600
01-21-2021, 10:05 AM
Another recent prostitution sting.
https://www.standard.net/police-fire/18-arrested-in-weber-county-prostitution-sting/article_8a25c1bf-0232-5df7-b878-4e0c56614819.html
Apparently the laws against that sort of thing are quite strict there
N if you get caught they post your picture up online
miss.a.p1600
01-21-2021, 10:24 AM
Prostitution: A Florida snapshot
In October, Polk County once again made regional news with a big prostitution bust, some 277 johns and hookers arrested in an undercover sting named “Operation No Tricks, No Treats.” Such endeavors happen regularly in Polk under Sheriff Grady Judd.
Judd’s jurisdiction’s, which encompasses some 420,000 people, is one of the more prolific enforcers of prostitution law in Florida. In 2016, according to Florida Department of Law Enforcement statistics, the Polk Sheriff’s office made 209 prostitution arrests. In Broward County, which has a population of 1.9 million, the county’s various police forces arrested only 219 people. Miami- Dade County police, who cover 1.2 million people, made 86 arrests. All of Hillsborough — 1.35 million people — chalked up just 181 arrests, mostly in Tampa, which accounted for 113 of them.
Judd says Polk doesn’t have any more prostitutes per capita than Tampa or southeast Florida. “We have less. The overwhelming majority of people we arrest don’t come from this county. They come from other counties.”
Indeed, if prostitution arrest statistics in Florida prove anything, it’s that enforcement is idiosyncratic.
https://www.floridatrend.com/article/23577/prostitution-a-florida-snapshot
Djoser
01-21-2021, 07:05 PM
So instead let's give a criminal record to a bunch of girls, and condone illegal recordings by LE, just to be sure that we get the billionaire for paying for a handjob. That'll teach him.
You have a valid point but no need for the sarcastic tone. Unless I'm seeing more of it than is really there?
The real victims of so many of these cases (and of the recent SESTA/FOSTA bullshit) are the working women of the adult industry.
Above all, we must retain respect for them.
rickdugan
01-23-2021, 10:07 AM
DJ, I think you're picking up more genuine bewilderment than anything. Why would any adult entertainer ever be ok with police overreach relating to adult entertainers, whether a billionaire was caught up in the mix or not?
I'm also going to respectfully disagree with the notion that this affects primarily providers. Whether it is surveillance to catch paid sexual services or cops pulling shit like following people out of strip club parking lots, we are all in the same boat. In police abuse situations like this, we should all be hoping for MORE billionaires to be caught and then to fight back, not less. Kraft has likely saved hundreds if not thousands of future providers from this type of surveillance. And if they could get away with it in massage parlors, what was going to be next? Hotel rooms where paid services were suspected? Maybe even in strip club CRs?
whirlerz
01-23-2021, 02:16 PM
Wait til we all get locked down in interment camps:beat:
rickdugan
01-23-2021, 09:41 PM
Wait til we all get locked down in interment camps:beat:
Putting aside the very real slippery slope concerns that you are alluding to in a joking manner, which the Founding Fathers understood all too well and is the very reason why we have these important Constitutional protections in the first place...
Does it take an internment camp to ruin an adult entertainer's hopes, dreams and aspirations or is a criminal record enough? Knowing the answer to this as we all do, why should any of us be ok with police giving an adult entertainer a criminal record under any circumstances, especially using illegal tactics?
There are very few of us that haven't seen or heard about this in action and it goes far beyond escorts and massage parlors. On any given night, cops in a variety of areas are pulling shit like ticketing girls for ridiculous ordinance violations and giving them records in the process, following people out of strip club parking lots and running every plate parked in a strip club lot hoping to find a warrant hit or expired tag. Then of course there are those areas where raids in tactical gear and questionable searches are conducted. Then of course let's not forget the jurisdictions that routinely send undercover cops into clubs, some of whom use questionable techniques bordering on entrapment to get girls to agree to sex for money.
The list goes on. Adult entertainers are sadly easy targets for police harassment and abuse because very few sympathize with them and they often don't have the resources to stand up for themselves. So they tend to roll over when mistreated by authorities because they feel vulnerable and exposed. Prosecutors, understanding this all too well, make it easy by offering them what seem like sweet deals, like they did to Kraft and the other Johns, in order to notch their wins while not having to defend LE's methods.
Finally someone held them to account and saved a lot of girls from having a life damaging criminal record in the process. I just don't understand, here on Stripperweb of all places, how anyone who supports adult entertainers could possibly consider this a bad thing.
kamiliam
01-23-2021, 09:55 PM
I just don’t understand why we have to bow down to this man(Kraft)? Like I said I am glad he got off. I am in favor of decrim are you?
He isn’t some trailblazer for the movement. He hasn’t given statements to this and he didn’t help with that women’s legal bills or anything did he? He didn’t feel like he should be in trouble so he used his top notch legal aid. I’m glad his ego helped bring that department’s ego down a notch.
miss.a.p1600
01-23-2021, 10:26 PM
I just don’t understand why we have to bow down to this man(Kraft)? Like I said I am glad he got off. I am in favor of decrim are you?
He isn’t some trailblazer for the movement. He hasn’t given statements to this and he didn’t help with that women’s legal bills or anything did he? He didn’t feel like he should be in trouble so he used his top notch legal aid. I’m glad his ego helped bring that department’s ego down a notch.
Indeed.
*sorry I couldn’t resist*