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Bye-bye, pimpmobile
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March 27, 2000 | An expensive, ostentatious car lets
everyone know that although prostitution
is a seedy industry, there's always room
for some class. Shiny chrome, powerful
engine, some colored fur in there
somewhere will raise it all above the
riff-raff. Think about it. What kind of
sex could possibly be procured from a
pimp who drives a Geo? But sometimes the gilded image can work
against a pimp. When
Montreal police sentenced Pierre Gagnon
for running a prostitution ring last
week, for instance, they hit him where
it hurt the most. The $27,500 fine paled
in comparison, as the Canadian
government seized Gagnon's home, his two
Jaguars and a 28-foot Bayliner
boat.
Visit the Naked World archive send e-mail to Jack Boulware Gagnon was first arrested in 1998 for running his Sexxx Enr escort service, using classified ads in the Journal de Montreal newspaper. According to police, clients paid about $140 for the home-delivery service. A driver received $20, the prostitute got $70 and Gagnon pocketed the rest. Cost of doing business wasn't cheap. The classified ads ran into the hundreds of thousands of dollars. He was such a big client of the newspaper that the publisher even invited him to a golf tournament. "His revenue was pretty impressive," the prosecuting attorney told the court. Although his squadron of hookers and drivers brought in an estimated million in cash annually, Gagnon declared bankruptcy 10 years ago, and has insisted he has had no income since then. All paperwork for his home and cars was placed in the names of friends, because if you're flat broke and need to hide ownership of your Jaguar XJ6, that's what a friend is for, isn't it? Gagnon's attorney assured the judge that his client has moved into another occupation, presumably one that will allow a man to commute to and from work using public transportation. Gagnon is truly his own start-up company now, because the Canadian government confiscated nearly everything he owned, adding up to several hundred thousand dollars. Every item in his house was seized, says the Montreal Gazette. But Gagnon won't have to rebuild his
life completely. In a rare moment of
compassion, prosecutors allowed Gagnon
to keep a handful of things, including
two chandeliers and a window shade.
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