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Report: D.C. Madam Commits Suicide
From Fox News:
Police say DC Madam Deborah Jeane Palfrey has committed suicide in Florida.Police were called to the home of Palfrey's mother on Thursday to investigate the suicide.
Palfrey was convicted on all counts a couple of weeks ago.
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Wow. That is really sad.
May 1, 2008 1:30 PM | Reply | Permalink
**Lemme guess. Was it the old 3 shots to the back of the head kinda suicide?
May 1, 2008 1:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
My first thought, exactly!
May 1, 2008 1:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
Hmm, did anyone check Dick Cheney's whereabouts when this "suicide" happened?
May 1, 2008 2:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
Somebody needs to check David Vitter's cellphone records. First Brandy Brandy Britton shows up dead, now Palfrey herself. Two dead prostutitues and Vitter is still in office?
May 1, 2008 2:26 PM | Reply | Permalink
I agree. Brandy Britton worked for me while she was in college (as a waitress...)--I would NEVER have thought she would commit suicide.
May 1, 2008 5:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
I hope she gave her complete list of "Johns" to a few people - to hand out liberally in the event of her untimely death . . .
May 1, 2008 2:26 PM | Reply | Permalink
I'm betting somebody WANTED/NEEDED her dead. Prison would have been relatively easy for her -- she's abused her body in the past anyway.
May 1, 2008 1:35 PM | Reply | Permalink
Palfrey was in prison years ago. She knew what it would be like.
May 1, 2008 1:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
This is a pretty sad indictment on society, when she is dragged through the courts, and the john, well, elliot, is (although mercilessly mocked in the court of public opinion) given a mere slap on the hand with a wet bus ticket, if even that.
May 1, 2008 1:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
To be fair, she wasn't a street whore, she was running the business.
May 1, 2008 3:14 PM | Reply | Permalink
and her client(s) in the US senate go on unperturbed.
May 1, 2008 1:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
Incredibly sad.
May 1, 2008 1:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
Very sad.
May 1, 2008 1:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
OK, very sad, but...is it that newsworthy as to deserve pushing the WSWS Voter Suppression Scandal out of the headline on the front page here?
May 1, 2008 1:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
WTF???
May 1, 2008 11:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
I don't even know what to say.
For some reason though all I can think of is that Elliot Spitzer and David Vitter are never going to suffer consequences even remotely close to this.
May 1, 2008 1:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
Her poor mother.
May 1, 2008 1:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
That was my initial reaction, too. Her mother was the one who found her. What a horrible thing.
May 2, 2008 6:55 PM | Reply | Permalink
FAMOUS SUICIDES THAT WERE MURDER BY US INTEL COMMUNITY:
1) GARY WEBB broke story tieing CIA cocaine deliver to inner city LA gangs to create the crack epidemic and gang banging problems used by police state to pass draconian laws CREATE THE PROBLEM SECRETLY, THEN CREATE THE SOLUTION THAT BENEFITS THOSE WHO CREATED THE PROBLEM.
2) THE NUMEROUS MURDERS BY US INTEL COMMUNITY (Ollie NOrth's CMAG in Arkansas) in Arkansas with medical examiner FAWNY MALLECK obstructing justice by falsifying his gov. records.
3) SUICIDES OF TERTIARY WITNESSES TO JFK ASSASINATION especially after Garrison's investigation began.
May 1, 2008 1:44 PM | Reply | Permalink
ZOMG!!! Hitlery killed her with the gun she used on Vince Foster, in order to drive the NC robocalls off the media's radar!!!!
May 1, 2008 1:44 PM | Reply | Permalink
in my wildest dreams, this is exactly what happens to Bush after he is convicted of war crimes and left to languish in a prison cell for the rest of his pathetic, blood-stained life.
May 1, 2008 1:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
Does anyone remember J. Clifford Baxter?
May 1, 2008 1:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yep.
May 1, 2008 2:05 PM | Reply | Permalink
Nope. But I surely do love that wikipedia.
May 1, 2008 4:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
Anyone know how much time she was facing?
This is real sad. Especially when you think about what her "crime" was.
Getting rich people laid. Sure, she was a character and she knew that what she was doing was illegal.
But as a moral matter, she shouldn't have ever been charged with a crime.
May 1, 2008 1:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
Up to 55 years, depending on sentencing.
May 1, 2008 7:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
**4 to 6 years in the slammer. I doubt she wanted to do the time. Probably had a backup plan. Doubt if it included dangling on the end of a rope in a shed. So not a girlie thing to do.
May 2, 2008 2:44 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yeah, the pundits were saying 4 to 6 last night, but from what she herself said in an interview, they were figuring on 8 to 15. I'm not sure why her lawyers would have been so much more pessimistic than the pundits.
May 2, 2008 6:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
Not for nothin', but this is the second suicide connected with this case.
May 1, 2008 2:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
Brandy Britton, allegedly employed by Palfrey was arrested in 2006 and committed suicide (by hanging) in her home in January... am I the only one seriously troubled by this?
Quote from MSNBC:
One of the escort service employees was former University of Maryland, Baltimore County, professor Brandy Britton, who was arrested on prostitution charges in 2006. She committed suicide in January before she was scheduled to go to trial.
Last year, Palfrey said she, too, was humiliated by her prostitution charges, but said: "I guess I'm made of something that Brandy Britton wasn't made of."
May 1, 2008 2:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well, she was a pimp, not a prostitute or a john. These are different things, and personally I think it makes a lot of sense that pimps face the most punishment.
It's very sad, though. Apparently she argued to a court once that if she went to prison she'd be beaten or killed. Not that you'd expect such an argument to be persuasive, but this almost certainly proves that she really meant it (whether it was actually suicide or not)!
May 1, 2008 2:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
Will take a beating for this, but happen to think what a woman does with her body is not the matter of the government unless she is hurting someone. This is sad, and I do think people wanted her dead. However as it stands its against the law, and she broke it, again so sad!
May 1, 2008 2:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
sean669 although we clearly disagree on candidates. I actually agree with you. These women are of age and knew exactly what they were doing. Simply put it's a service and the issue of selling sex in a moral judgment. As a New Yorker I was less than stunned to hear about Elliot Spitzer. I think the main issue with him is that as a prosecuotr he made a special case of busting prostitution rings CAN WE SAY HYPOCRITE!
But as far as paying for a little sumthin' sumthin' (Where are you Maxwell? Sorry I got distracted) I am not that offended and less than surprised.
I know there are issues of power and male dominance and a host of other related problems. But, the truth is it's a job and there are people (men and women) who are actively seeking these services. We have no right to judge these women, to the point where they take their lives. Our nation is dying a slow moral death!!
May 1, 2008 3:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well said. Im also glad that someone agrees with me on at least one thing...lol.
May 1, 2008 4:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
I'm sure David Vitter is having a wild party right now in the traditionally compassionate Republican spirit.
May 1, 2008 2:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yes, He has the Diapers and Champaign !!!
May 1, 2008 2:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
Will her charges now be dropped like Ken Lay's were when he died before sentencing?
May 1, 2008 2:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
That's an interesting question. One would think so. So if the charges are dropped, does that mean her estate will hold on to her assets? Or does RICO not require a conviction for assets to be seized? (I seem to remember reading that this is the way it works, one reason RICO is so controversial.)
One of the things she mentioned in interviews after her conviction was that she would lose everything she had. If this really was a suicide, I would guess it was that prospect, at least as much as the prospect of getting prison time, that led her to take that course.
May 2, 2008 6:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
Somebody has got to hold these prosecutors accountable. Their goal all along has been to intimidate and humiliate the women involved in this case for no other reason than to indulge their own moralizing egos.
Who was the "victim" of Palfrey's "crimes" --the men who willingly paid for escorts, the escorts who willingly worked for her, or the hotels that they all used?
Sure, it was technically illegal. So is tearing the tags off of a mattress.
With all the serious public safety issues we face, it's a disgrace that the Bush-tards wasted taxpayer money to pick on these women.
May 1, 2008 2:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
Tearing the tags off of a mattress is only illegal for the mattress vendor. Not for the purchaser.
The activity she was involved was not just "technically" illegal, it was illegal, period. I'm not saying I think it should be, just that it was.
Still, charging her with racketeering was way over the top, especially when she is the only one being prosecuted. She faces a maximum of 55 years imprisonment and the loss of all her assets, and her "clients" skate scot-free? How is that justice?
May 2, 2008 7:05 PM | Reply | Permalink
Committed suicide or was suicided?
May 1, 2008 3:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
How many suicides has this case wrought in total? Two? Three?
Is there any reason the entirety of her files cannot now be made public?
May 1, 2008 3:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
sorry to possibly sully one of my favorite places but here is an interview Palfrey gave to (gulp) Alex Jones - wherein she claims she could be "suicided"
http://www.infowars.com/media/230707palfrey.mp3
May 1, 2008 3:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
I think we can see from the way that "Johns" get treated that there is hardly any reason for murder here. Seriously. If Cheney himself was found to be on her grand list it would probably do his reputation well!
Settle down with the bogus conspiracies, people.
May 1, 2008 3:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
Payback's a bitch.
Very sad day for Palfrey. My condoleances to her family and loved ones.
May 1, 2008 3:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
Don't forget J.H. Hatfield author of Fortunate Son
May 1, 2008 3:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
Huffington Post is reporting that Palfrey claims she is not suicidal and that she would be killed and be made to look as if she committed suicide.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/05/01/dc-madam-dead-in-apparent_n_99653.html
May 1, 2008 4:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
It's being reported that she hanged herself. For some reason, I'm just bot buying this.
May 1, 2008 5:03 PM | Reply | Permalink
Heart breaking.
Will the "reputable" investigative news group that she reported selling her client list to now step forward?
May 1, 2008 6:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
This is a tragedy. It is not a laughing matter. Whatever the circumstances, hanging is not something women do lightly.
Long ago, before I became a therapist, my husband and I (along with our young son) picked up a young woman hitchhiking on a Saturday morning - in the rain. The father of her children had just hung himself... rather than go back to prison.
This speaks not only to prostitution... and all those who enable it. It also speaks to prisons. To the fact that we in the US incarcerate 25% of the world's total prisoners. Do you understand that? We've become the world's gulag!!! And prison is not a place any of us would like to be.
RIP poor soul.
RIP America.
May 1, 2008 7:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
Since you're a therapist, I'd be interested in your opinion on my admittedly non-scientific observation. It seems to me that suicide by any means is not something that women do lightly. I have known of men who committed suicide when faced with the prospect of prison, bankruptcy, humiliation, etc. But fictional cases aside, I have not known any women who committed suicide absent some form of mental illness: clinical depression, schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, etc. Is that just that my own small observational sample is skewed, or is that what the professionals see as well?
May 2, 2008 7:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
Could this "suicide" be related to the "suicide of Assistant US Attorney Jonathan P. Luna?
The focus on the DC Hookergate story has now moved to Baltimore, and the firing by the Justice Department in December 2004 of the US Attorney for Maryland, Thomas DiBiagio. DiBiagio was fired, along with a number of other US attorneys, after George W. Bush's re-election for political reasons. One of DiBiagio's public corruption targets was the staff of then-Republican Maryland Governor Bob Ehrlich, some of whom had engaged the services of Madam Palfrey's escorts. The US Attorney's office in Baltimore first became involved in the investigation of the prostitution ring after the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) office and IRS agent Troy Burrus in Baltimore made a criminal referral to the US Attorney's office in Baltimore. Subsequently, an asset seizure warrant for Palfrey's assets was issued. Palfrey and her employees used two telephones in Maryland for their escort business, 301 231-5800 in Rockville, near some of the "mansions" in Potomac, Maryland and Great Falls, Virginia described by "20/20" as the locations in DC where Pamela Martin escorts would pay calls, and 410 244-1818 in Baltimore.
DiBiagio had already witnessed the brutal murder of his Assistant US Attorney Jonathan Luna in December 2003. A husband and father of two, Luna had departed in his vehicle, strangely leaving his cell phone on his desk at his office, and drove a circuitous route through Delaware, New Jersey, and then Pennsylvania before he was found in a creek near the Pennsylvania Turnpike in Denver, PA stabbed to death 36 times, supposedly with his own pen knife. Federal authorities leaned toward a suicide but local investigators treated the death as a homicide. In 2004, DiBiagio claimed he was being pressured to stop his investigation of Ehrlich's staff for links to gambling (particularly the gambling interests of jailed Maryland/DC GOP lobbyist Jack Abramoff), prostitution, and other corruption and filed a threat report with the FBI. The Washington Post and Washington Times then reported that Luna was fearful that DiBiagio was going to fire him, which led to Luna's "suicide."
From
May 1, 2008 10:35 PM | Reply | Permalink
Woops. Messed up the link:
Hookergate Expands to Cheney
May 1, 2008 10:37 PM | Reply | Permalink
Oh, rats. The two big paragraphs were supposed to be block quotes, too.
May 1, 2008 10:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
My first thought when I heard this story was - suicide, yeah... right.
Just looking at the odds, women rarely hang themselves, and they rarely would hang themselves in such a place that their family would likely be the first to find them. They would more likely make sure a stranger (housekeeper or delivery person) would discover them.
Also, why would someone scheduled to be sentenced in June (or July?) kill themselves on May 1st. Why not wait a little while longer?
May 2, 2008 12:38 AM | Reply | Permalink
From the sources I have read online- friends and acquaintances of hers-she was not the suicidal type.
Frightened and slightly paranoid,yes, but suicidal, no.
Was she offed? The sheriff of the town immediately pointed out it was "definitely a suicide". How would this pinhead definitively determine that was the case?
He couldn't without professional forensics and an investigation of some kind. An attempt at throwing the dogs off the scent. Perhaps she really had the goods on some important politicos who would strangle their first born to prevent her from leaking anything in her little black book. For once I would like to see some justice from this if there was truly any criminal.
By the way, where is that little black book of hers?
May 2, 2008 1:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
Since Palfrey apparently saw her own end coming, let's hope that she squirreled away some evidence 'to be opened in case of my demise.'
May 2, 2008 2:21 AM | Reply | Permalink
When you have a clients list that include the scum de la creme of Washington, it is a matter of time before a dead body turns up. How can we live with the utter corruption of Washington????
May 2, 2008 4:27 AM | Reply | Permalink
From Huffpost:
May 2, 2008 4:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
Suicided. I like it. Don't know if that's your original, but that's definitely one that should catch on and become part of the cultural lexicon...
May 2, 2008 8:49 AM | Reply | Permalink
Oops. Just replied about the term "suicided" to David above. I guess people have already figured out how to contort that noun into a verb, at least in participial form.
May 2, 2008 8:53 AM | Reply | Permalink