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Orlando Weekly To End 'Adult' Ads

Paper Won't Be Charged With Racketeering

POSTED: Wednesday, February 27, 2008
UPDATED: 11:43 pm EST February 27, 2008

The Orlando Weekly agreed at a hearing on Wednesday to permanently remove its "adult services" ads in exchange for all charges against the alternative newspaper being dropped.

Three Orlando Weekly advertising managers, Brian Martin, 43, the classified director for the newspaper; Katherine Miller, 27, an account executive; and Matthew Whiting, 37, an account executive, were arrested in October during a job fair at the downtown Orlando Marriott Hotel by Metropolitan Bureau of Investigation officers.

The trio received nine months of pretrial diversion with 100 hours of community service.

The deal comes a few months after the MBI released undercover tapes showing three Orlando Weekly employees allegedly selling adult ad space to undercover agents.

In a news release, the MBI said it "applauds that the Orlando Weekly has agreed to 'Do the Right Thing' and remove the 'Adult Services' advertising, which was a category of advertising that was fueling the Central Florida organized prostitution trade. This will solve the problem that the MBI's investigation sought to address."

In October, MBI Cmdr. Paul Zambouros told Local 6 News that the Orlando Weekly had been "sort of a broker to prostitutes."

Local 6 News reported in October that adult-escort ads netted the Orlando Weekly $900,000 over the last five years.

"There are numerous advertisements for massage parlors and escorts, and we have made numerous arrests for prostitution from the people from the advertisements," Zambouros said in October.

The arrests followed a two-year undercover investigation dubbed "Operation Weekly Shame."

Watch Local 6 News for more on this story.

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