Cops: Quadriplegic Former District Attorney Played 'Pimp'

June 16, 2009— -- What do a former district attorney, a quadriplegic on a respirator with use of only one finger, and the leader of a high-class prostitution ring that allegedly transported women across state lines for illicit trysts with dozens of well-off Minnesota family men, have in common?

They are, according to police, all the same man.

From his home computer, John St. Marie, 65, and wheelchair bound since contracting polio as a boy, allegedly organized a prostitution ring, which police say, catered to over 30 Minneapolis men. St. Marie is alleged to have arranged travel for out-of-state call girls, some of whom may have been in the U.S. illegally, and oversaw an online community in which the men could "brag about their exploits" and share information about prostitutes to whom they had paid hundreds of dollars, police said.

This shadowy social network composed of middle-aged lawyers, businessmen, bankers and accountants called themselves the Minnesota Nice Guys, and for three years they organized and discussed sex with prostitutes flown in from Florida, according to police.

Police say they monitored group picking up prostitutes from the airport, taking them to expensive sushi dinners, and visiting some of Minneapolis's swankest hotels. In one case, an alleged john was seen leaving a hotel after an illicit rendezvous to attend his son's little league baseball game.

"The cheapest date was $300 an hour," said Sgt. Matt Wente, of the Minneapolis Police Department's Violent Offender Task Force. "Some men would have two- or three-hour appointments. That's $900 to $1,500 to wine and dine these women and have sexual contact."

One woman, a 34-year-old Columbian national, charged $500 an hour, police said.

Some of the men, police said, found St. Marie through a Web site, theeroticreview.com, that allows johns to rate prostitutes. The local men created a "loose-knit group," e-mailing each other directly and receiving weekly messages from St. Marie about prostitutes whose travel from Florida he had organized, police said.