Collins v. Com.

• Decision Date: 14 October 1983
• Docket Number: No. 830265,830265
• Citation: 226 Va. 223,307 S.E.2d 884
• Parties: Robert O'Dell COLLINS, Jr. v. COMMONWEALTH of Virginia. Record
• Court: Virginia Supreme Court

Page 884

307 S.E.2d 884

226 Va. 223

Robert O'Dell COLLINS, Jr. v. COMMONWEALTH of Virginia.

Record No. 830265.

Supreme Court of Virginia.

Oct. 14, 1983.

R. Wayne Dawson, Roanoke, for appellant.

Karen A. Laserson, Asst. Atty. Gen. (Gerald L. Baliles, Atty. Gen., on brief), for appellee.

Before CARRICO, C.J., and COCHRAN, POFF, COMPTON, THOMPSON, STEPHENSON, RUSSELL and THOMAS, JJ.

COCHRAN, Justice.

Robert O'Dell Collins, Jr., was tried by a jury on an indictment charging him with violation of the pandering statute, Code § 18.2-356. ^* Finding him guilty as charged, the jury fixed his punishment at confinement in the State penitentiary for 10 years; the trial court entered judgment on the verdict.

On appeal, Collins contends that the trial court erred in admitting, over his objection, evidence that at other times he had committed offenses similar to the offense charged in the indictment. He also argues that the evidence was insufficient to support his conviction.

Collins and a co-defendant, Lewis Barney Brooks, operated, under various trade names, an escort service which arranged by telephone for customers to have dates with escorts provided by the agency. On August 2, 1981, Linda G. Fox, a Richmond Police Department officer working undercover as a decoy, met Collins to be interviewed for employment in the escort service.

Fox testified that she used the name "Lynn" in this assignment and that Collins used the name "Bob Holliday." In their interview, Collins asked what she "thought the service was," and Fox replied, "[J]ust an escort service." Collins showed her an agreement containing a paragraph providing that any violation of local, State, or Federal law by the escort would give cause for immediate termination of employment. When Fox inquired about the meaning of the paragraph, Collins said, "I guess if you get caught, it's illegal." Although Collins did not ask Fox to sign the agreement at that time, he told her he would require her to sign it before he employed her. Collins informed Fox that he would communicate with her if he needed any more help.

Fox testified that the day after her interview with Collins she telephoned the escort service, talked to Steven Zipp, the telephone operator, gave him her name and telephone number, and told him she was available for work. Zipp said he would call "if he needed any help that night."

About four hours later, according to Fox, Zipp called back and said he had a date for her with one John Kelley at a specified address in Henrico County. Zipp instructed her to collect the $15 agency fee payable to the escort service and to call back that "everything was okay." Fox proceeded to Kelley's apartment to keep the appointment. After collecting from Kelley in cash the $15 agency fee, she agreed to engage in acts of sexual intercourse and sodomy with him for an additional $60. She then telephoned Zipp to ask whether she could accept Kelley's check for these services. Replying in the affirmative, Zipp cautioned Fox to make sure Kelley had "a recent deposit slip." While Kelley was writing the check, other police officers, alerted by Fox, entered the apartment and arrested him.

Zipp, charged with the same offense as Collins, testified as a witness for the Commonwealth. He stated that Collins had hired Fox and that her name tag "Lynn" was tacked on the board in the office along with the name tags of other girls employed by the agency. Zipp said that he called Fox on August 2 and connected her with Kelley, and that he listened to the telephone conversation while Fox and Kelley arranged to meet.

Zipp testified that Collins and others had trained him to disconnect the office telephone if customers persisted in mentioning specific sexual acts. He acknowledged that Fox had called him from Kelley's apartment to inquire whether she could take Kelley's check for "a blow job and a roll" and that he had approved because Kelley was a regular customer. Zipp asserted that although he had his "suspicions" about what the escorts were doing on their dates, he had no proof, and what the girls did was their own business. Nevertheless, Zipp recalled one occasion when Collins got into an argument over money with Shelly, Collins's girlfriend, who was employed by the agency as an escort. Zipp observed Collins take all the money from Shelly's pocketbook. Demanding that he give the money back to her, Zipp testified, Shelly "said something about ... 'it's not your pussy' and then they were arguing some more."

About 11:30 p.m. on August 2, Officer R.E. Saylor and other police officers executed a search warrant by conducting a search of the premises where the escort service's office was located. The officers seized telephone equipment, including an answering recorder connected with several telephones, ledgers containing names and addresses of customers, names of escorts, fees paid to the agency, card files showing names of customers and amounts they paid, blank employment agreement forms, and pre-stamped envelopes addressed to "Anthony Giovanni" at a certain Richmond post office box. The index cards included names of persons identified as law-enforcement officers. Name tags for girls the agency employed were seized, including one for "Lynn," the name used by Officer Fox. Saylor identified cards showing "good calls," where fees were paid, and others showing "bad calls," where the callers would not pay the required charges, or were suspected of being police officers, or the transactions were not completed for other reasons noted on the cards.

Saylor testified that at the time the premises were searched, three outcall escort services were being operated there under the names of Dreams Unlimited, Kitty Kats, and Hound Dogs All Male Escort. All three were listed in the classified advertisements of local newspapers.

After the events of August 2, Saylor testified, he and another officer met with Collins at the latter's request. Collins wanted to know why Saylor "was so intent after him." Collins informed the officers that he had been operating a service in which he would send girls out when he needed their services, that he considered himself "more or less a talent agent," and that he was not aware of what the girls did when they responded to the calls.

Terry Brady, another telephone operator for the agency, also testified as a witness for the Commonwealth. He described in detail the operation of the business. The escort was required to collect in cash from the customer and deliver to the agency a $15 agency fee for the first hour and $10 for an additional hour. In addition, the escort generally collected a "tip" for services rendered, which Brady defined as sexual intercourse; from this tip the escort paid the agency a referral fee of $10 per hour. Brady identified the charges on agency records seized by the police officers and introduced in evidence. The escorts used the pre-stamped envelopes addressed to "Anthony Giovanni," a name which Brady said was fictitious, to mail checks or money orders for fees to the agency at its post office box.

According to Brady, Collins and Brooks established the practice of having each escort who paid the agency fees in person at the office leave a $5 tip for the telephone operators for each "good call." To Brady, a "good call" was one where the escort and the customer agreed on charges and the escort stayed an hour and collected in addition to the agency fee whatever amount she required for her services. If the escort could not reach an agreement with the customer after collecting the agency fee the agency "would send out another escort."

Brady was familiar with the employment agreement providing for termination of employment upon violation of any law. Although he signed one himself and delivered others to some of the girls to sign, he regarded the agreements as meaningless. He said that Collins instructed him in answering the agency telephone. Brady was told that if a customer used "nasty words" in asking for a girl to perform an "illicit sexual act" he was to hang up, but he was also taught the special language, innocuous in itself, used by those familiar with "the business" to mean various kinds of sexual activity. Brady collected the money from the girls and kept a record of the payments. Collins and Brooks took their shares in cash; Brady retained his tips.

Kim G. Cleary, an informant who arranged for Officer Fox to meet Collins, testified that she herself was interviewed by Collins in August 1981 before Fox's interview. Refreshing her memory from notes she made about an hour after her interview, Cleary said she applied by telephone for employment with the escort service. She was then interviewed by Collins in his car. Collins, who gave his name as "Bob Holliday," informed her that the job might mean "holding someone's hand or hugging someone or sleeping with them, touching them." She could expect to receive tips for her services. Although Collins did not say she was hired, he asked when she could work, and when Cleary said the next day, he expressed satisfaction. He did not show her any employment agreement. Collins did not want to meet Fox, and he asked Cleary to "fill her in." Cleary, however, suggested that he meet Fox.

Over Collins's objection, the trial court permitted the Commonwealth to introduce the testimony of two former employees of Collins and Brooks. Brenda Walker testified that they employed her as a prostitute on December 8, 1981, after she signed one of the employment agreements. When she went on calls she performed various sexual acts, including sodomy. On each call she collected an agency fee of $15, which she paid the agency; out of her tip she paid the agency another $10. When business was good, she earned approximately $2,200 a week. Referring to Collins and Brooks, she said, "I knew what business these gentlemen were in as well as they knew what [business] I was in."

Judith Blain testified that Collins approached her in ...