Motel's latest amenity: a police sting

The business had been abuzz with illegal activity. The bank was about to foreclose. Then the police had an idea: Take it over and go undercover.

By CHRIS TISCH
© St. Petersburg Times
published April 21, 2002

CLEARWATER -- The Aqua Clara Motel had become such a hassle that the owner abandoned it. Fed up with unruly tenants, she just gave it up, told the bank it could have it. Good riddance.

Neighbors say the motel has been in gradual decline for years. Recently, it had plummeted. The motel became a veritable headquarters for prostitution and drugs on Fort Harrison Avenue N, the neighbors say. Some tenants sold dope or peddled flesh from the parking lot or sidewalk.

With the owner gone, a manager had taken over the rent collection but wasn't paying the mortgage. The bank decided to foreclose and kick everyone out. Fearing they might encounter some resistance from the residents, bank officials called Clearwater police and asked them to stand by.

Lt. Tony Holloway, a bright and enthusiastic department leader whose district includes the motel, had an idea.

It was something the department had never done.

Holloway's plan: After everyone had been booted from the motel, the department would essentially take it over. Undercover officers would slip in where some tenants had been. The motel then would become the epicenter of an undercover sting that would target both prostitution and drugs.

Within about an hour after the residents had been told to leave Monday afternoon, the switch was in place: The motel was again abuzz with activity that looked legitimately illegal.

But the two guys dressed like dirtbags who hovered around the bus stop bench with a couple of rocks of cocaine in their pockets? They were cops.

The woman in the hoochie-mama skirt strutting up and down the sidewalk in front of the motel, prompting many a motorist to tap his brakes? Also a cop.

And the six guys sitting in room No. 5 waiting for the decoys in front to set up motel-room rendezvous with people looking to buy drugs or sex? All cops.

Within 10 minutes of the switch, the undercover female officer had a customer. A man in a green car pulled onto a side road. He wanted a favor for $25. They agreed on a transaction.

Seconds later, police cars surrounded the green car. The man was arrested on a charge of prostitution solicitation.

Within a few minutes, the man was whisked away in a transport van. A police volunteer hopped into the man's car and pulled away en route to the impound lot. The police cars disappeared into the depths of the neighborhood, where officers waited for the next transaction to go down.

Then, without much of a hitch, the undercover female officer started strutting again.

Back in 1989, Holloway became the first officer in Clearwater to sell drugs undercover on the street. He can remember the first time he went out with 20 pieces of rock in his pocket. He thought it would take all night to sell that much. It took an hour.

He was promoted to lieutenant about 16 months ago. He spent his first year working budgets. Though he liked it and felt he learned a lot, he missed the rhythm of working outside the office.

In January, the 17-year department veteran became district commander of Clearwater's District 2, which stretches from Highland Avenue to the water.

Undercover street-crime arrests have always been a department tactic, but Holloway plans to rev up those efforts. He plans to spearhead two prostitution stings and one drug sting per month. The goal is to move the hookers and dealers out of town instead of from place to place within the city limits.

An operation outside the Aqua Clara Motel had already had been planned when Gary S. Gray, executive vice president of First National Bank of Florida, called Holloway a couple of weeks ago.

Gray said the previous owner gave up the property because tenants abused her verbally and physically. The mortgage hadn't been paid since February. The bank's plans were to clean up the property before deciding whether to sell or demolish it.

Gray asked Holloway if police could stand by while the residents were removed.

Holloway agreed. The eviction date was Monday.

After hanging up, Holloway glanced at his calendar and noticed that the Aqua Clara operation was also scheduled for April 15. That's when he put the two together and thought of expanding the operation to inside the motel.

He went to his commanders, then to police Chief Sid Klein and told him about the idea.

Klein asked: "What do you need?"

About 30 bike team and community policing officers met in a squad room early Monday afternoon to plan the sting. They had changed their work schedules to be a part of the operation.

The next step was heading to the motel, where Holloway and other officers met with Gray.

Wearing a stars-and-stripes tie, Gray walked onto the property and approached a man who sat at a table in front of the office eating Cheetos. The man at one time had acted as manager. Gray told him everyone had to go.

The manager protested, saying the tenants had recently pooled their money to pay $1,400 in bills to get electricity restored.

"Now we don't have nothing," the manager said. "We're all homeless now."

Some tenants slipped out right away, probably to get away from the police.

Holloway referred the other tenants to Everybody's Tabernacle, a local homeless project.

But some tenants were angry, including Mike and Kelly Eisaman, who had been living at the motel for five months with their three young children. They live in a single room that has a cramped kitchen and a tiny bathroom.

Kelly and her daughter, age 3, sleep on a bed, while the two boys sleep on a pullout sofa. Mike catches shut-eye on a chair. Their 11-year-old dog, who is deaf, also lives with them.

For this they pay $900 per month. The couple said they have looked but can't find anything better.

"My kids have always had a roof over their heads," Kelly said.

Eisaman called Lynn Hanshaw, an attorney with Gulf Coast Legal Services, which helps poor people. Hanshaw came out to the motel during the eviction and told Gray the bank didn't have the right to kick people out without notice.

Holloway decided to allow Eisaman and her family to stay. "They just got stuck in the middle of this," he said.

The next day, police allowed the other residents to return, though their power and water were turned off Wednesday. Hanshaw got a judge to sign an injunction requiring the bank to restore power, which was done on Thursday. Hanshaw said the bank can begin legal eviction procedures May 1, though she plans to seek compensation for the day they were kicked out.

For their part, bank officials say they had a right to remove the residents because the business is a motel, not an apartment. Clearwater police said bank officials had told them the removal of tenants was proper.

Having dealt with the tenants, Clearwater police could go ahead with their operation Monday.

By midafternoon, it was in full swing. Undercover officers were planted throughout the neighborhood, keeping an eye on the decoys in case something went wrong. They had a few arrests here and there, but traffic really increased at dusk.

A man in a white four-door circled a couple of times, then pulled onto a side street. His brake lights glowed. He stopped.

The undercover female officer on the sidewalk strutted toward the car. She wore a very tight and very short striped dress.

"Are you working?" the man inside asked.

She snapped back: "Of course I'm working."

Then they started talking business. "Fifteen? That's all you got?" she yelled at him.

Then he started counting singles. Make that $12.

No matter. The woman directed him to the Aqua Clara. She told him to head to Room 5, the one in the corner. That's her room, she told him.

The man was expecting a good time. Sex for $12.

He opened the door. Six Clearwater police officers stared at him from inside. The man started yelling, "Sorry, sorry, sorry!" The officers wrapped handcuffs around his wrists. Minutes later, he was gone and the operation was back in order.

The Aqua Clara Motel was built in 1948 and probably was considered a pretty posh place at the time, said Mike Sanders, a Clearwater historian.

It was built on land created by the dredging project that made Venetian Point. In those days, Fort Harrison was a good address.

But starting sometime in the 1960s or 1970s, the neighborhood started slipping. There was a revitalization effort in the late 1970s, but that sputtered. Prostitution up and down the strip became common in the 1980s.

The Aqua Clara probably started to lose some of its classier clientele as well, Sanders said.

"The focus was on the beach and they were building nicer hotels out on the beach and also out on U.S. 19," he said.

The motel has had problems for at least 15 years, though it seems to have gotten worse in the past three, said Desiree Hoyle, who lives in a nice, clean house right behind the motel.

If calls to police are any indication, she's right. Police were summoned to the motel 34 times in 1997 and 1998 combined. In the year 2000, they were called to the motel more than twice that many times. There were 63 calls to the motel last year, and 52 through mid April of this year.

Hoyle said her 14-year-old daughter would get propositioned by prostitutes when she walked to the corner to get a newspaper.

"She refuses to go out for a paper anymore," Hoyle said.

Dr. Norman Ulrich's office is next door to the motel. His mother and father-in-law spend the winters living above his office.

"They told me they see drugs and prostitution big time," the doctor said. "It's better than watching any soap opera."

He said prostitutes have propositioned patients as they exit their cars. "Are you here for me?" they ask.

Chief Klein said even if there are not many arrests, operations such as this tell neighbors that the police know their concerns.

"It's a matter of perception," he said. "It tells people we're aware of it and we are doing something about it."

In the days after the operation, Holloway received more than a dozen thank-you phone calls. One resident shipped brownies to the officers.

When the sting was over, 11 people had been arrested or given notices to appear in court for prostitution solicitation. Two others were arrested for attempted purchase of crack cocaine and one for obstruction.

One of the men who tried to pick up an undercover prostitute was a military sergeant who worked as a local recruiter. He drove a vehicle with government plates. He was in full uniform. He offered $25 for sex. He was given a notice to appear in court.

Another was a man who works for the city of Clearwater's solid waste department. He drove his own car but was still in city uniform when he was arrested.

The operation ended about 9:30 p.m. after some six hours of work.

Holloway said these types of operations will continue with more frequency and in other problem pockets of his district as long as the drugs and prostitution are there.

"We're saying we're having a war on crime," Holloway said. "If they show up again, my phone is going to start ringing again. And I'm going to get my guys back out there. If you do police work by the book, you're never going to win."

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