The DC Prostitute Expulsion was the attempted forced removal of a group of suspected sex workers in Washington, D. Police officers, frustrated by inability to clean up the prostitution problem in D. As the group passed the Washington Monument at about in the morning, Washington Post reporter Bill Dedman happened by in a taxi on his way home from the Post newsroom, and began interviewing the women and police officers.
He ran to the Agriculture Department building across the Mall to use a pay phone to ask the Post metro desk to send a photographer. Before a photographer could be sent, Post photographer Stephen Jaffe also happened by on his way home from another assignment. Post police reporter Jeffrey Goldberg soon arrived. Jaffe began taking photos, causing the police officers to flee. The women never crossed the bridge, but photos of the parade on the bridge's approach ramp demonstrated the police officers' intent to make them march into Virginia.
The women had been marched 1. After the police left, the women were driven back to Thomas Circle by men in vans, who had been following the parade at a distance, and most were back on street corners within half an hour.
Beginning about a. The angry line of women, many of whom were dressed in leather miniskirts and brightly colored tube tops, ambled 1. A police scout car with flashing blue and red lights led the procession and another brought up the rear. The next day, Goldberg and Dedman reported that Arlington County police officers admitted having sent homeless people and the mentally ill across the Arlington Memorial Bridge into D.
Virginia politicians expressed outrage at the D. Congressman Stanford Parris , who represented Virginia's 8th congressional district , complained "We get all the sludge, all the garbage, most of the prisoners, and now their prostitutes.
