Prostitution Sting Results in 6 Arrests

Six males, ranging from a 16-year-old boy to a 77-year-old senior citizen from Pennsylvania, were arrested within 35 minutes Monday morning as Ventura police conducted a prostitution sting.

The suspects approached a female undercover officer walking a two-block stretch of Thompson Boulevard beginning at 9:55 a.m., said Sgt. Quinn Fenwick.

“She wasn’t out there for three minutes” when the first one arrived, he said. “There was a traffic jam to get to her.”

Fenwick said more arrests would have occurred if not for a lack of staffing.

“We ran out of officers to arrest them all,” Fenwick said. “It was unbelievable.”

Five adult men were booked into the Ventura County Jail on suspicion of solicitation of prostitution. An unidentified teenager was cited and released to his parents.

Booked Monday were: Royce Nutting, 53, and Henry Haro, 43, both of Ventura; Danny Moreno, 26, of Santa Paula; Edward Lamb, 73, of Santa Barbara and Ralph Pope, 77, of York, Pa.

Police regularly conduct sweeps along the stretch of inexpensive motels and used-car lots in an effort to squelch prostitution.