A legal secretary at one of Washington’s most prominent and well-connected law firms, Akin Gump Strauss Houer (sic) & Feld LLP, has been suspended after telling her bosses she secretly worked at night for the escort service run by the so-called D.C. Madam, Jeane Palfrey.
The woman both serviced clients and, at times, helped to run the business, Palfrey told ABC News in an interview to be broadcast on “20/20″ Friday.
The firm said it would not make her name public.
According to e-mails the woman sent to Palfrey on her Akin Gump account, she “enjoyed and even missed” the work she did at night for Palfrey, who has been charged by federal prosecutors with running a large scale prostitution ring.
:Perhaps not the weekly grind, but was thinking that a day a week would be fun and spa money,” the legal secretary wrote to Palfrey last year, after Palfrey had closed her business and was considering whether to re-open it.
Palfrey said the Akin Gump secretary would at times “answer the phones” and assign women on nights when Palfrey was unavailable.
(snip)
McLean said the woman told the firm she was a government witness inthe D.C. Madam case, and the firm was hesitant to dismiss her because of that.
According to the e-mails provided to ABC News by Palfrey, the Akin Gump woman was interested in helping to restart the escort service after Palfrey had closed it, suggesting it could be done from the Akin Gump offices.
“It is a shame to basically throw away over a decade of hard work and contacts,” she wrote last October, just before federal agents raided Palfrey’s operation.
“I think that handling the phones 4 to 5 nights a week is a very fair offer and would be something that I could easily do, even with my paralegal duties as they could pretty much be done simultaneously infront of a computer,” she wrote.
A lawyer for the woman, Athan Tsimpedes, said his client “never took over the business.” He said his client “does not want the publicity that Ms. Palfrey desperate seeks.”
Considered one of the most powerful firms in Washington, Akin Gump partners make up a who’s who of Washington insiders, including Vernon Jordan, former Speaker of the House Tom Foley, former Secretary ofHealth and Human Services Tommy Thompson, former Republican National Committee Chairman Ken Mehlman and co-founder Robert Strauss, an adviser to numerous presidents.
The name of the law firm is actually Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP.
There are lots of postives mentions about the woman who answered the phones for Pamela Martin Associates in the various reviews of escorts who worked for PMA that we’ve found. Is this the same woman? Here’s a couple of reviews…
What kind of world is it where working for a big law firm is okay but working for an escort service is a scandal? Who is worse - lawyers or escorts?
The women who worked with Pamela Martin Associates weren’t being exploited. By all accounts they were mature, intelligent women who made a choice to make money through selling sex and companionship. Why is that illegal? Is it to ‘protect’ them or to keep women in their place? Read this review…
I have no reason to believe this isn’t true - here’s a bright scientist who can’t get paid for something she could for free? If she went over to meet this guy and slept with him with no money exchanging hands - that’s legal. But for her to do it and get paid - that’s a crime? How does this make any sense at all?
UPDATE: Deborah Palfrey is Julia…so that’s NOT the woman from Akin Gump…this is from the indictment..
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November 26th, 2007 at 11:41 pm
[...] dirty poltics interest you, you might want to want the reviews we posted of the D.C. Madam’s girls… or just search this blog for the words Palfrey or Vitter for a lot [...]
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