Shame Is City's Aim

There are 11 men who probably never wanted to get their 15 minutes of fame this way. They were the first guests on "John's TV."

The program premiered on the city's cable access channel Thursday. It included a slide show of men convicted of soliciting prostitution with their names shown below their photos. The images are also displayed on the city's Web site.

A Denver cop standing by his cruiser warns rather ominously that anyone hiring a hooker may be arrested.

The idea for using publicity as a deterrent started with the publication of photos in newspapers. Several other cities have already started TV shows: "BUSTED" in Orlando, Fla.; "Shame TV" in Charlotte, N.C.; and in Calgary, Alberta, the "Calgary Ho Down."

"I see it as a deterrent. We know we are not going to stop the problem. There is a reason why they call it the oldest profession in the world," said Pamela Corvelli, a neighborhood activist who has campaigned for a crackdown on prostitution.

She lives half a block from East Colfax Avenue, a busy street named after the late Vice President Schuyler Colfax that is a favorite of prostitutes, pimps and drug dealers.

Corvelli said she is not opposed to prostitution if it is confined to traveling businessmen calling an escort service from a hotel room.

"We don't want them coming onto our front porch or into our back yards. I cannot even go to the store without being propositioned. One pimp asked me if I was working for anybody because I could make a lot of money for him," she said.

Andrew Hudson, spokesman for Mayor Wellington Webb, said: "When we heard the horror stories from the community - finding condoms in back yards, sex in the alleys, children seeing people having sex in cars, we knew we had to do something."

Hudson said putting more police in the area wasn't doing the job. "We decided we need to do something unconventional. We think this is a deterrent that will work. People won't want their wives, colleagues, bosses and members of their churches to see them on this show."

He said the city decided not to show the photos of the prostitutes because their situation is already desperate enough, and "we don't want to advertise.

"Prostitution is not the glamorous, Julia Roberts kind of picture people think it is," he said.

By Robert Weller