We know the police use computers to hunt, catch, and log the bad guys. Now it seems at least one group is giving the gendarmes a taste of their own medicine: Hookers in Missouri are reportedly using the Internet to swap information about undercover cops – including, according to one report, the cell phone number of St. Louis County's vice squad commander.
"That was the shocking thing," commander Rick Battelle told the Associated Press, who acknowledged he gave the number out just once, and then in a bid to nab one suspected prostitute.
In fact, according to some published reports, earlier this month undercover officers meeting two Springfield women at a Maryland Heights hotel found two laptops, and a Website showing the officers' cell phone numbers, undercover names, and even details about their vehicles.
Police are known to keep computerized files on actual and suspected prostitutes, including aliases they use and where they've been known to work, the AP said, while the ladies of the evening, for their part, are known at times to advertise their services on the Web, sometimes with no dressing up and sometimes as "escorts" or "escort services."
But the St. Louis Post-Dispatch has also reported county detectives finding a database passing through the Web to help the hookers trade information as they try staying steps ahead of the police. For example, the two Springfield women were tracked by police through message boards, e-mails, and Websites, the paper said, adding that the women used those outlets to screen clients and pass the word along.
St. Louis County police Capt. Thomas Jackson indicated to the Post-Dispatch that prostitutes going high tech isn't exactly a surprise in today's world. "You will still always have the seedy end of prostitution with women on the street trying to feed their crack habit," he told the paper. "But you also will have others who see it as a business. It's only natural that these people on the high end are going to use technology."
