Not Doing Jack

Nashville’s Sexually Oriented Business Licensing Board—or SOB, as it’s known around town—is great at ensuring that strippers don’t dance too close to paying customers and that the “lighting level” in private booths is appropriate. But when it comes to more serious matters, like strippers giving handjobs for money inside the clubs, the SOB is somewhat less relevant.

Take the case of stripper Michelle Peacock, who goes by the stage name Lexi and works at Déjà Vu on Demonbreun Street. In March and May, according to police reports, Peacock “offered to manually stimulate (an undercover cop) until ejaculation for $100 U.S. Dollars.” Peacock was offering this during the middle of the afternoon and was arrested for prostitution after her second encounter with detectives.

While the Metro Police Department put a stop to Peacock’s extracurricular activities, the behavior went unnoticed by the SOB board and inspector, whose job is to make sure that Nashville’s strip clubs are on the up and up. When the SOB failed to revoke Peacock’s license after the arrest, one of her colleagues took the matter into her own hands by sending an email complaint to the entire Metro Council.

“I have been a contractor at Déjà Vu for over a year now,” a Déjà Vu stripper wrote to the legislative body in mid-September. “Another contractor with the stage name of Lexi was arrested and received a prostitution charge at our club a few months ago. Because of her good friendship with the general mananger (sic)…Lexi is still working with us.” The letter points out that after Peacock’s arrest, she continued to try her, um, hand at prostitution. “Lexi,” the angry exotic writes, “was caught by one of the DJs a few weeks ago giving a customer a ‘handjob’…. Every day Lexi commits some form of prostitution in our club.”

As of this writing, Peacock and Déjà Vu have yet to receive so much as a warning from the SOB regarding the matter. In fact, the last time the club received any kind of reprimand was in October 2006. That citation was for violating the so-called “three-foot rule,” part of the Metro SOB ordinance that prevents strippers from coming within three feet of customers. The board later dismissed that charge, says SOB inspector Christine Gruen, who began working for the board in April of this year.

“[Police] called me when [the arrest] happened,” she says. “We do not have any policy or procedure that requires [vice] to tell me anything. We have a good working relationship, and they do tell me what’s going on out there. Similarly, when I get a complaint about prostitution or illegal drugs in a club, I get on the phone and talk to them.”

Strip club owners, their attorneys and advocates have found fault with the SOB laws since practically the minute they were written in 1997. The laws set guidelines for almost every aspect of adult businesses, including the height of a stage, the layout of a club, the size of so-called “private booths” and lighting schemes. The law also requires that dancers register with the city, undergo a criminal background check and get fingerprinted. But the ordinance went through eight years of litigation regarding its constitutionality before it even could be enforced.

Meanwhile, a much more offensive sex culture in Nashville coexists with this highly regulated strip club industry—namely, clubs that allow unfettered and unprotected group sex. They’re able to operate without government interference solely because they operate as private clubs that serve only their own members. (For more on this topic see “Why Lap Dances In Nashville Are Illegal But Group Sex Isn’t,” Aug. 23.)

“Prostitution is already illegal,” says Joe Savage, a Nashville-based strip club consultant. “We don’t need to create more bureaucracy to enforce laws that the vice squad is capable of enforcing.”

The SOB bureaucracy already has been created—and costs Metro taxpayers close to $100,000 annually—but it would seem that what Savage suggests is now the case. Two vice squad detectives answered an initial complaint about Peacock last spring and then performed an investigation.

All the while, the SOB and its inspector somehow managed to avoid nabbing a stripper giving handjobs in the middle of the afternoon. Peacock’s case will come before a judge in December. Until then—unless the SOB revokes her license to strip—she can manually stimulate men during the lunch hour until her legal defense fund is full.