Blue Trap

Gay City News is reporting that police have been going to adult stores and arresting men on the basis of vague and bizarre prostitution charges.

Robert Pinter was looking for a DVD and perhaps a good time when he visited Blue Door Video on First Avenue in the East Village. He was approached by an attractive young Asian-American man.

"He is smiling, he's really a cute guy, very friendly," said Pinter, 52. "He initiated the conversation and drove the whole conversation."

Pinter said they agreed to have sex and the young man, who told Pinter he was 29, suggested they leave the shop and go to his car, which was parked outside. As they were exiting, the young man, who never told Pinter his name, mentioned money for the first time.

"He sort of threw in 'Oh, I want to pay you $50 to suck your dick,'" Pinter said. "When he offered me the money my first thought was he wanted me to pay him the money. When I realized that it wasn't that way I thought it wasn't logical."

Pinter said nothing in response and continued walking with the young man. Once outside, they were surrounded by a group of men who Pinter soon learned were police.

"At first I thought it was a gang because they didn't say anything, they didn't identify themselves as police," Pinter said. "They took my bag, started going through my possessions. I must have asked them four or five times, 'Why are you putting me under arrest?'"

Pinter, who has no prior arrests, was charged with prostitution. He was held handcuffed in a van for hours while officers made additional arrests around Manhattan, then photographed and fingerprinted at a Lower East Side police precinct, and finally arraigned on October 11, roughly 24 hours after his arrest, in the criminal courts downtown.

Sounds like entrapment to me. What's the deal here?

God forbid these cops should go into any one of New York's straight strip clubs, right? Right?