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TARPON SPRINGS – Police were called to the home of DC Madam Deborah Jeane Palfrey’s mother on Thursday to investigate an apparent suicide. Police have confirmed that the dead person is Palfrey, 52. Palfrey was dubbed “The DC Madam” by the national media after her arrest for allegedly running an upscale call girl ring in the nation’s capitol. |
She was convicted on Tuesday of money laundering and using the mail for illegal purposes and racketeering, but she had not yet been sentenced. There has been much speculation in the media about who was on Palfrey’s client list, but few details came out during the trial. She had appeared on ABC’s 20/20 and said that her service — Pamela Martin and Associates — had a client list that included some 10 to 15 thousand names.
Sen. David Vitter, a Louisiana Republican, was linked to the service, and while Randall L. Tobias resigned as a deputy secretary of state after acknowledging to ABC News that he used Palfrey’s service for massages, no other big names emerged. Police say Palfrey’s body was in a small storage shed on the west side of her mother’s mobile phome. There were handwritten notes at the scene indicating that Palfrey intended to take her own life, and no foul play is susected. 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.”
You will have to excuse me for being a bit suspicious. She predicted in 1991 she would be “suicided”.
Update FYI: The information about her being “suicided” on Wikipedia has been removed since I posted this story this morning. In fact, much of the Wikipedia entry has been revised.
>>I’m looking at 55 years in a federal
>>penitentiary
That does seem like kind of a hefty sentence for the non-violent crime of providing pussy for the well-heeled Washington politicians. I don’t recall the Mayflower Madam getting 55 years in the slammer.
Alex Jones may not be the most credible news source, but then again neither is CNN.
Apparently she made various statements on Jones’ radio show, that she does NOT have any intention of committing suicide.
There is a recording available of her saying this…
http://prisonplanet.com/audio/010508palfrey.mp3
Does CNN have a recording of the statement that they attribute to her?
Also, one of her “girls”, Brandy Britton, also ended up committing “suicide”.
Make of it, what you will…
http://tinyurl.com/3pfxne
During several recent appearances on The Alex Jones Show, Palfrey also said that she was at risk of being killed and that authorities would make it look like suicide. She made it clear that she was not suicidal and if she was found dead it would be murder.
Palfrey had threatened to release the names of well-known clients of her upscale call girl ring in the nation’s capitol, and had indicated that Dick Cheney may be one of them.
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“No I’m not planning to commit suicide,” Palfrey told The Alex Jones Show on her last appearance in March, “I’m planning on going into court and defending myself vigorously and exposing the government,” she said.
The phone numbers (sans names) were provided to the media to research to discover who was on the list. For whatever reason, the media did not bite on the lead.
Now consider, just for a lark, when a person is most likely to flip. Would that be while they still have a court case or when actually facing jail time? My thought is if she was ever going to name names now would be when since 55 years of a cell vs a comfortable few days chatting with a prosecutor of either political persuasion would be preferable.
So I guess then Dick Cheney had her write all those suicide notes or he said he would kill her?
RBG
How fucked up is this country when someone providing a normal human need, for money, would get 55 years when shithead street thugs who rob and steal and will never be a productive member of society get less.
Very coincidental timing. John, you should have added a graphic over her head that reads “Mission Accomplished”. Our entire military machine still hasn’t killed Bin Laden, but obviously some black bag outfit had no problem offing the DC Madam. A few years back there was a huge flap about a missing girl, suspected as death, that some Democratic congressmen had dated or just met. And his career was ruined without any proof of wrongdoing on his part. Now here we have the dead body of a infamous DC madam who could, and probably would, name names if faced with jail time. And she dies quite conveniently to all who might be on her client list. And you can easily believe that nothing will be made of this. Especially if some high ranking republicans are involved. Let’s face it. Billions of tax payer dollar are at stake here. Dollars that might not go to the defence contractors that some career threatened politicians had been lobbyed for. So our entire defence based economy was at stake. Does anyone really believe she’d be allowed to screw all that up?
And yet O.J. Simpson is playing golf somewhere because that dumbass knew how to hide his assets. I find it hard to believe she didn’t do the same.
If only there had been some conceivable way for a person to leave a full disclosure of names and details with someone instead of protecting those the madam knew would kill her.
RBG
When women commit suicide, they very seldom hang themselves. That, in itself, is suspicious.
I drove by the scene yesterday on my way home. There were five police agencies involved. I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many TV trucks.
#49 According to studies Women are less likely to use violent methods of suicide than men. Generally they prefer poisoning. When they do use violent methods they tend to prefer methods that leave their identifying physical features intact, such as hanging, wrist cutting, and electrocution. More rarely, a woman will use a method like a simple gunshot to the head. It is believed that women who commit suicide behave this way because they can not stand to destroy their self image.
Interestingly this suicide behavior is not common to all women, just those in “Western” or strongly “Western Influenced” cultures. In other cultures violent suicide in women is often as common or more so than it is for men.
I can’t say I’m surprised. She’s dead because had a lot of information that could hurt a lot of very powerful people.
Has anyone attempted to find the data deleted from her Wikipedia article and restore it?
49 hhopper. Yeah, I get where you’re going with that. The mastermind couldn’t afford professional killers.
RBG
This links to “Wired Science” blog where the question asked is “How would you Murder someone and fake a suicide”. Most of the discussion of course is off point, but shows a different bent than here on DU.
http://tinyurl.com/5lemvj
#52. Rich- I went back to Wikipedia last night to reread the information that I had originally linked to referencing Alex Jones taped interview (thanks JVP,)on her suicidal intentions, and was a little surprised to find 1/3 to 1/2 of the whole entry on Palfrey missing, and not just the Jones info, I wish that I had copied that article, but it seems to be in the ether now. Interesting that.
I thought Wikipedia kept (and allowed access?) to every version.
RBG
#56. RBG- thats my understanding. So maybe its wrong to use it as a source? So why would it be edited, and by whom?
#56. RBG- thats my understanding. So maybe its wrong to use it as a source? So why would it be edited, and by whom?
Welcome to the club of reality. Wiki can be edited by ANYONE. Any idiot can go in and change Wiki articles. There was a news article months ago about how Wiki told the public that government agencies were changing articles, as well as corporations.
Yet, people run around acting like Wiki is an encyclopedia or something… it’s a website that shows you what everyone ‘thinks’ about these subjects- and are completely bias depending on who edits it last..
A great blog post as I’ve come to expect on this blog. Keep up the great work