Volume 17 • Issue 34 • Dec. 31,Jan. 14 – 20, 2005
Police Blotter
Downtown sex ring
Police arrested a man and his partner on Mon. Jan. 10 in the Village on charges that they ran a high-price call girl service from the office of New York Confidential, an escort service at 79 Worth St.
In a raid at the Worth St. office of New York Confidential on Fri., Jan. 7, police arrested six men and one woman on charges of promoting prostitution, money laundering and possession of drugs. According to court papers, police found heroin, powder cocaine, crack cocaine, ketamine (a drug known as special K) and marijuana in the office.
The main defendant, Jason Sylk Itzler, 37, was arrested at the Gansevoort Hotel and his co-defendant, Hulbert Waldroup, 37, was arrested at his home on Thompson St., according to law enforcement officials. Both were arraigned on charges of promoting prostitution, money laundering and drug possession.
According to the indictment, a sting operation by the Manhattan South Vice unit indicated that the ring would send women to clients in various hotels, including the W. Hotel just north of Union Sq. and the Grand Hyatt Hotel on Park Ave. for sexual intercourse and fellatio for $990, plus $50 to the “phone girls for setting up the date.” A vice unit detective said he found that New York Confidential “does two-girl shows for guys” at a cost of $1,500.
The escort service was advertised in New York Magazine with Internet links. Payments were made to companies, Gotham Steaks and Tribeca Models, set up to receive and hide the criminal nature of the payments, the indictment says.
The seven defendants arrested at 79 Worth St. on Jan. 7 were Velina Stamova, Jane Edwards, Onya Meier, Homira Rashidzada, Michelle Dykstra, Mildred Caballeros and Bernard Braun.
When Itzler was arrested, he was on parole from a New Jersey prison where he served six month of a five-year sentence for smuggling 3,869 ecstasy pills from Amsterdam in 2001, according to a New York Post article. The article said Itzler told a Post reporter last month, “I run a great agency, I don’t break the laws.”
Itzler and Waldroup are both scheduled to plead to the charges on Fri., Jan. 14.
Rescue dog
A Village woman walking her dog on the Tribeca waterfront on Saturday afternoon Jan. 8 was surprised when her pet jumped over a retaining wall at the picnic area of Pier 25 and plunged into the Hudson River. Gina Ruiz, of Jones St., phoned 911 for help, then climbed down onto piling at the side of the pier and spotted her 3-year-old pointer bitch, Maverick, swimming a few feet away under the pier. Police arrived first followed by firefighters in a small boat who rescued the dog at 3:35 p.m.
City-As-Sex
A science teacher at City-as-School on Clarkson St., was assigned to administrative duties last week after an investigation into charges that he had engaged in consensual sexual activity with a female student, 18, in a classroom in the school early in December.
Richard Condon, special commissioner for investigations in the Department of Education, said the teacher, Fernando Salvador, 54, is accused of having “an inappropriate relationship” but no criminal activity because the student is not a minor.
Investigators, according to newspaper reports, reported that Salvador performed oral sex on the student on the afternoon of Dec. 3 in a darkened locked classroom but was discovered when another teacher walked in. Salvador has denied having sexual contact with the student, but investigators said she confirmed the encounter.
A Department of Education spokesperson said the department was seeking to dismiss Salvador and another teacher at West Side High School on W. 102nd St. accused of having a consensual sexual relationship with a student in October.
—Albert Amateau
WWW Downtown Express
