New details have emerged about the secret surveillance of a local sex club by the Lansing Police Department after it received an anonymous email that alleged the club was attracting and supporting prostitution, illicit drug use and public sex.
According to an investigatory report filed last month by Lt. Michelle Spoelma, the head of LPD’s Special Operations Division, multiple undercover officers spent “multiple different days during different times” conducting covert surveillance of the parking lot at Club Tabu, which is inside Fantasies Unlimited, 3208 S. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., in south Lansing.
Two officers conducted an initial undercover operation in early 2020, according to a police report Mayor Andy Schor released in October. At that time, officers were provided a tour of the facility and club. During the tour, the officers (whose names were redacted because they operated undercover) “observed one male sitting at a table fully clothed watching porn on a television.” Neither of them reported any prostitution or drug activity during their visit.
The two undercover officers returned on Feb. 6 “during daylight hours” and again “during the evening hours.” During the day, officers again did not observe either criminal activity, according to the report. They did observe a man following the two officers and another man waiting at a gloryhole, “believed to be used for oral sex.” Neither officer was solicited for sex.
In the evening investigation, officers returned and found a mostly empty club. They sat on a sofa and saw others patrons walk by who “glanced” at the pornography playing on the television. The officers were not solicited for sexual activity and again reported they saw no criminal activity.
The investigation was then discussed with staff at Ingham County Prosecutor Carol Siemon’s office, according to Spoelma’s one-page report. Prosecutors told City Pulse that the discussion was informal and followed an unrelated meeting about felony drug cases in the city of Lansing.
Schor ordered the latest police reports to be released after city officials previously told City Pulse that reports are not created for undercover operations that do not find criminal activity — a police documentation issue that several transparency advocates have raised concerns about.
The investigation, which was first reported by City Pulse in August, took place entirely in secret last February, nearly two months after an email was sent to City Councilman Adam Hussain. That email — signed by Anne N. Amos — alleged that the club had allowed prostitution, illicit drug use and sex in the parking lot. That email was sent in late November 2019 and forwarded to then-Police Chief Daryl Green, who sent it off the department’s Special Operations Division.
Attached to the email were several photographs that were taken inside the club and allegedly showed sexual activity. City officials have refused to release those photos out of concern that doing so may pose an unwarranted invasion of the privacy of the persons photographed, as well as a violation of state law that prohibits the distribution of photos of unclothed persons taken without their permission and in a place where they had a reasonable expectation of privacy.
Both entrances to the club have signs that note a prohibition on photography and videography. The door to the club also has signs indicating the area is private and that solicitation for prostitution or drug use are prohibited. Since the story on the undercover investigation broke, the club now has a sign just inside the front door prohibiting photography and videography.
Spoelma’s report reiterated that Lansing officers had searched law enforcement databases for the name “Anne N. Amos” — a possible play on the word “anonymous” — but were unable to locate any person by that name. Officers did not attempt to send an email back in response.
Despite the criminal concerns expressed by city officials over the release of the photos, Captain Robert Backus, who supervises the entire investigations division of LPD, said there was not — and would not be — a criminal investigation of the person who sent the email. He also said there is a clause in state law that protects those who submit sexually explicit material to report a crime. Backus also said that proof of criminal intent would be difficult to establish in this case.
Kate D’Adamo, a consultant at Reframe Health and Justice Consulting, works with issues around sex worker rights and the intersection with LGBTQ. In a phone interview, she raised significant concerns about the entire investigation and complaint.
She said the investigation was part of a national movement to surveil and criminalize sex workers. And this case was a form of “empowering individual citizens” to participate, she said.
“Looking with no evidence with something where people were victimized, and using that as a basis to do this, is incredibly common,” D’Adamo told City Pulse last week. “This is a private citizen who violated folks in the adult industry with impunity, then handed it off to law enforcement who began investigating while being paid. Unfortunately it’s very, very common.”
D’Adamo noted that the histories of LGBTQ people and sex workers are intertwined and that conflating the two — as happened in this case — are “deliberate” and “common” across the world. She also said the entire complaint and police response was “rooted in homophobia.”
She said that the failure of the police to pursue the person who sent the initial email complaint only sends a strong message that violation of people’s rights leads to permission for folks to target communities with impunity. She also said she fears that it could lead to violence.
The city’s message: “This is who you can victimize and we don’t care,” D’Adamo explained.
Former Detroit District Judge Rudy Sierra has spent a career addressing police abuses of LGBTQ people, including sting operations and undercover operations. He wrote the seminal 1990s report “Bag-A-Fag” for the former Triangle Foundation, which determined the Michigan State Police had a biased program to target men who have sex with men in public spaces.
After reviewing reports from the Lansing Police Department, Sierra labeled the investigation a violation of the Fourth Amendment, which prohibits unreasonable search and seizures by the government. He said that after undercover officers toured the sex club and found no criminal activity, they had no legal basis to continue. That should’ve been the end of the probe, he said.
“You have to have a reasonable suspicion that criminal activity is occurring,” Sierra said. “Once they walked through and saw no criminal activity, they did not have that reasonable suspicion. They should have stopped right then.”
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