B Y - A L E X - C R E V A R

U.S. Attorney Richard Deane may be a reluctant hero, but that doesn't diminish the role his office played in indicting pimps for forcing underage girls into prostitution

s a screenplay, it would resemble "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit"—an inner-city crime story streaked with pure evil and made even more horrifying because of its realism. The script would recount how 13 men and one woman, with names like Pimp Redd, Scooby, and Poochie, beat and raped and sold girls. Their middle-school victims, who might just as easily have been playing soccer or hanging out with friends, experimenting with lip gloss or complaining about math homework, were instead pistol-whipped, shot at, and tied to beds. Terrorized into prostitution, they were tortured if they tried to escape from this nightmare.

If the time and setting for this screenplay were Georgia in the recent past, the penalty for pimping underage girls would be tantamount to a parking violation, a mere fine and probation. With misdemeanor charges as their principal operating costs, the pimps would, in essence, be allowed to maintain a band of slaves, who, in a twist of logic, would actually be more likely to be arrested than their tormentors.

If the specific locale were Atlanta—which, in fact, it is—the film would open with a band of pimps acting as though they had a virtual license to sexually exploit teenage girls. These modern-day slave traders would prey not only on adolescent girls, but on their parents, who tremble with the fear that the wrong meeting on an inner-city street could mean kidnapping and prostitution for their daughters. Handcuffed by the law, or the absence thereof, the Atlanta Police Department would be virtually powerless to stop these abuses.

Enter our hero—albeit a reluctant one—Richard Deane, the United States Attorney for Georgia's Northern District, who recently brought law and order to this real-life drama. Armed with a federal indictment, Deane (AB '74, JD '77) helped nab 14 of Atlanta's most notorious pimps in what had been one of the most lenient pimp-law cities in the nation.

"We're parents, like other folks, and [underage prostitution] struck a chord. This was an issue the U.S. Attorney's Office needed to address because we were best suited to address it."—Richard Deane

"We were spurred along by the fact that the Atlanta Police Department and the Fulton County D.A. didn't have strong laws to allow them to go after the people involved in this activity," says Deane, who submitted evidence to the U.S. magistrate, thus providing the documents needed to pursue the pimps. "But also, we're parents, like other folks, and [underage prostitution] struck a chord. This was an issue the U.S. Attorney's Office needed to address because we were best suited to address it."

Deane secured the indictment in time for a late-night, week-before-the-Super-Bowl sweep conducted by the APD and FBI. This series of coordinated raids—which could have involved armed resistance, gunfire, and possibly loss of life—netted 11 of the 14 pimps and was met with little resistance because of the discretion local and federal law enforcement officials had displayed during the entire investigation, which began in the fall of 2000. Prior to the overnight raids, only the head of APD vice and the highest-ranking FBI agents were aware of the plan. The officers who carried out the raid believed they were on an ordinary patrol.

The lack of resistance can also be traced to the fact that the pimps figured they were being taken on another fine-and-wrist-slap ride to the police station. What they didn't know is that they were making history as the nation's first pimps charged under the Racketeer Influenced, Corrupt Organizations Act—better known as RICO. So confused was one pimp during his arrest that he blurted out: "I don't work with no Rico."

"Without Rick's commitment to prosecute, there would have been no need to continue with the investigation," says Theodore Jackson, head of the FBI in Atlanta, with regard to the importance of Deane and the U.S. Attorney's office in the case. "You could tell how committed he was by the emotion he showed at the press conference after [the sweep], and he never shows emotion."

ven before he started school at the University of Georgia, Richard Deane knew he wanted to be an attorney. That was a bold revelation for a first-generation college student who had never even met a lawyer while growing up in Montezuma and then Macon. The extent of what he knew about lawyers was from the dramatized versions he'd watched with his grandmother on "Perry Mason."

But UGA wasn't going to be tougher for Deane than helping to integrate the Macon school system. The youngster was used to learning under pressure by the time he was college-aged. Besides, his grandmother had told him he could do it.

"She was my biggest influence," says Deane, whose daughter, Nikkia, graduated from UGA last month. "My grandmother did all she could to instill values in me. She made me believe I could do anything."

That determination proved valuable when Deane started law school as one of only six African Americans in UGA's 1974 class—though he is characteristically matter-of-fact about the endeavor, as the following conversation illustrates:

"Was law school tough, being one of so few blacks?"

"I think law school is just tough generally."

It has always been clear to those around him that Richard Deane makes difficult tasks seem effortless.

"Rick did a great job here," says retired law professor Richard Wellman, who taught first-year property and second-year trusts and estates and who recommended Deane to the University of Michigan law school, where he received his master of laws degree. "I'm sure it wasn't easy—the race issue was touchy then, as it is even now—but Rick was well-qualified and he had an attractive personality. That certainly helps."

Whatever his secret—because he was one of so few black law students, or in spite of it—Deane, who confesses that law school experience made him "more committed," has been blessed with a wealth of options since the day he left UGA.

Following graduation, he interviewed with the University of Michigan for a staff position, while enrolling in their master's program. At the same time, he applied for a job at the U.S. Attorney's Office in Atlanta. He got both. In a kind and wise gesture that has paid great dividends, the U.S. Attorney's Office told him to go complete his two-year commitment at Michigan and when he returned they would have a job waiting for him.

"It was more than remarkable, I couldn't believe it," says Deane, who was hired as a prosecutor. "The option allowed me to have no regrets about not completing the second law degree, and it gave me a job where I could be responsible for my cases and do an awful lot early in my career."

Only the head of APD vice and high-ranking FBI agents were aware of the overall plan. Police who rounded up the pimps thought they were on ordinary patrol.

Amongst those cases, and one for which he is most proud, is the conviction of an Atlanta police captain who used a stun gun on unruly prisoners. A jury found the officer guilty of civil rights violations. Deane made the closing argument just days after the Rodney King incident.

In 1994, after serving in several intermediary leadership positions within the U.S. Attorney's Office, including criminal division chief, Deane left to serve as a U.S. magistrate judge. In 1998, President Clinton nominated him for U.S. Attorney of the Northern District of Georgia and he was confirmed by the U.S. Senate. In his new position, Deane was made responsible for a staff of 40 prosecutors and 67 lawyers all told. From his corner office in the Richard B. Russell government building, he now oversees all divisions, which include criminal, drug, asset forfeiture, financial, and civil.

Deane's current schedule leaves little time for the courtroom. His days are filled with staff meetings and outreach program sessions involving community leaders and the heads of law enforcement agencies. One example is Deane's Strategic Approach to Community Safety Initiative, which involved starting a dialogue with citizens to see what crime and safety issues they're concerned about and then designing strategies to improve their communities. Still, Deane knows the details of every case that comes through the office and he serves as an advisor on the best methods for dealing with each one.

"I have been so lucky because it's an incredibly rich and talented group who take their job of representing the government very, very seriously," says Deane. "The finest lawyers I know have come through here."

Another important assembly, of which Deane is a member, is the group of African American U.S. Attorneys appointed by the Clinton administration. During Clinton's eight years in office, 22 of 93 U.S. Attorney slots were filled by African Americans.

"It was unprecedented," says Deane. "We formed an African-American working group and met routinely on a number of issues, including things like racial profiling and the death penalty—where there is a disparate impact on minorities. We also spoke regularly with U.S. Attorney General Reno. It afforded me the opportunity to work from the inside and be heard in some meaningful ways."

n the mean streets of Atlanta, a smooth-talkin' man driving an expensive car tells an impressionable adolescent girl that she's pretty, and she believes it. A short time later, the young girl (some as young as 10) is told she's a can't-miss prospect in the modeling game, and enters the stranger's apartment. In a matter of days, she's shackled to an operation and way of life from which she'll be lucky to escape.

The criminal bosses of this "enterprise" (as pimping is referred to in the federal indictment) transported their forced recruits throughout the city and across state lines, trading them as though they were slaves. So cavalier were the pimps that they produced their own training videos—with titles like "Pimps Up, Hoes Down" and "Really Really Pimping In Da South"—to teach their sexual prisoners how to behave and how to maximize profits on the street.

According to federal indictment 1:01-CR-074:

"Members of the enterprise, acting as 'pimps,' would solicit, entice, and forcibly kidnap juvenile females from various locations, including but not limited to: middle schools, public transportation, and strip clubs, as well as by recruitment from chat lines and through other juvenile female prostitutes. . . . 'pimps' would use 'breakers' to coerce the juvenile females into working as prostitutes; the 'breaker' would break down the juvenile female's will, by pistol-whipping her, drugging her, and having her repeatedly gang-raped."

"The pimps exercised so much control that they were taking the girls to school in the morning and picking them up after."—Nina Hunt, First Assistant U.S. Attorney

Last November, with child prostitution in Atlanta at its peak, 60 prosecutors, politicians, and Juvenile Court judges met to discuss the problem. Deane's office led the proceedings and the information gleaned in this early roundtable—based partly on the testimony of an Atlanta middle school principal—added weight to the growing concern.

"The pimps exercised so much control that they were taking the girls to school in the morning and picking them up after," says First Assistant U.S. Attorney Nina Hunt. "APD officers were aware that pimping of juveniles was happening, but existing state law offered inadequate tools to address the problem."

Based on the mounting evidence, the U.S. Attorney's Office decided to attack the issue from a federal standpoint, using racketeering as a basis of guilt. According to Assistant U.S. Attorney Janis Gordon, to whom Deane assigned the case, this was not a traditional racketeering case but a creative solution to a problem that needed to be solved for the betterment of the community.

After investigations showed that the pimps behaved more like a cartel than as individuals, the U.S. Attorney's Office, under the orders and legal strategy of Deane, began charging the pimps with crimes under the RICO statutes. In all, they were charged with more than 200 federal offenses under the conspiracy charge, including transporting girls across state lines, drug distribution, use of guns, kidnapping, and providing the girls with fake ID cards. These 14 pimps are currently in custody and awaiting a trial date.

The first child prostitution case in the nation to be prosecuted under federal racketeering laws could result in more than 20 years in prison for those who are found guilty—which is a far cry from the days of misdemeanor fines.

Fulton County Juvenile Court Judge Nina Hickson was among those who participated in the November summit. According to her, the child prostitution situation was dire.

"When I became Fulton County Juvenile Court Judge in May of 1999, I saw about three cases per month," says Hickson. "Now I see 25 cases per month. Often, you have to delve below the surface of the shoplifting or curfew violations that they might be in for to find out they have a history of prostitution."

Hickson says her role is to try to understand the child's situation and decide on an intervention to free her from her pimp—and, thus, turn her life around.

Deane was named to the "Time 100" for what the magazine called his "Pinch on the Pimps." Under his direction, Atlanta's pimps became the nation's first to be charged under federal racketeering statutes.

"What Rick has done is take these guys off the street so we can make the girls feel safer and make some progress with the girls' rehabilitation," says Hickson, who has known Deane since she interned at the U.S. Attorney's Office in 1983 as an Emory student. "This is a priority for Rick because he is a father and a tough prosecutor, but mainly because he is a person who cares about the community."

Although he deflects praise, claiming, "I probably get more praise than I'm due," Deane hasn't been able to avoid the limelight. The March 19 issue of Time named him one of their "100 Innovators," for his "Pinch on the Pimps."

Tangible rewards for the office's commitment to alleviating child prostitution in Atlanta came earlier this year in the form of two stiff, new laws. On March 27, Gov. Roy Barnes (AB '69, JD '72) signed bills making it a felony to pimp any child under 18 and giving the courts the right to seize assets used in the business of pimping children.

"We will never get a lick on these pimps like the one we just had," says Lt. Tony Biello, head of the APD vice unit. "This is the greatest lick there ever was on prostitution—anywhere—and Mr. Deane is the individual who is responsible for the action. There's no telling how many little girls he saved. This was the best and smoothest operation I've ever been a part of.

"There was simply nothing we asked that he didn't provide—federal indictments and federal prosecution," says Biello with regard to the legal clearance Deane provided, which made the sweep possible. "My respect for him is great. He is our hero—anything he asked, I'd do. If anyone messes with him, they mess with us, and the relationship between the entities [APD and the U.S. Attorney's Office] is the best it's ever been."

f a movie were made from this case —wherein a small-town kid makes good on the promise of success he made to himself and his grandmother—the U.S. Attorney would probably be played by Denzel Washington. There would be a prerequisite amount of violence and plenty of heroics and publicity for the principal crimefighter.

But in the real world—where U.S. Attorneys are also fathers, PTA members, and neighborhood watch leaders—no Oscars are given for the kind of behind-the-scenes heroics Richard Deane and his staff displayed in Atlanta's underage prostitution case. The only reward is knowing the community is in better condition because of his care and labor. Not even job security can be counted upon.

"I fully expect to be replaced," says Deane, whose position is vulnerable after the presidential election. "I have no qualms with it. That's the president's prerogative and that's the system."

If politics forces Deane to move on, those who have worked with him say he will be tough to replace.

"His commitment is impeccable," says Lt. Biello. "In the pimping case, he was the hammer that struck the anvil when it was hot. But more than that, he is the guy who picks up the ball and runs with it. I'll tell you this, I'm a Republican but I sure hope he keeps his job."

Of his legacy, Deane points to the partnership between his office and the community. His office advocates "using all available means to reduce gun violence in Atlanta," including mandatory sentences and no parole—a program called "Firearms in Atlanta Can Equal 5 years," or FACE 5. Another program—the "crack-house initiative"—alerts citizens to the fact that their property is a known crime area and can be taken away from them if it's not cleaned up.

"We practically get standing ovations in some neighborhoods," says Nina Hunt.

This is not the kind of relationship Hollywood usually depicts between inner-city residents and law enforcement officials. But Richard Deane is not a stereotypical law-and-order guy. His only role models as a child were fictional characters with a well-defined sense of doing what was right.

"I'll probably have to go look for a job," says Deane of his current job status. "I do know that I'd like to stay in Atlanta though. I love this city and I'd like to be remembered because we made it safer."

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