Nye brothel owner sentenced in bribery case

LAS VEGAS - Nye County brothel owner Joe Richards was sentenced today to five years of probation, 12 months in a halfway house, and ordered to pay a $250,000 fine for attempting to pay bribes to a former Nye County commissioner to benefit his business interests, announced Greg Brower, United States Attorney for the District of Nevada.

In June and August 2005, Richards, 75, paid $5,000 to former Nye County Commissioner, Candice Trummell, so that Trummel would revise a Nye County ordinance that restricted him from building a brothel on property he owned in Pahrump, Nevada.

Trummel was working undercover for the authorities and was instrumental in bringing the case against Richards.

The ordinance prevented the building of a legal brothel within 300 yards of the frontage to a road or highway.  Richards used the artifice of the "Richards Family Trust" to conceal the payments to Trummell, and also provided Trummell paperwork which falsely stated that he had paid her the money for the purpose of a law school scholarship.

He was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Robert C. Jones in Las Vegas. Jones also imposed special conditions of probation, which prohibit Richards from expanding his financial interests in the operation of brothels or other sexually oriented businesses, and require him to report to his probation officer any payments of money or in-kind services to any public official within 30 days of making such payments. Richards must also pay approximately $2,000 per month to the government to cover the costs of the halfway house. Richards pleaded guilty on March 16, 2009, to one count of Wire Fraud/Honest Services Fraud. 

Richards owns three of seven brothels in Nye County - Mabel's Ranch, Cherry Patch Ranch, Cherry Patch II Ranch - as well as a massage parlor known as the Madame Butterfly Bath and Massage Salon, and a strip club known as The Kingdom.

The case was investigated by the FBI and United States Postal Inspection Service, and prosecuted by First Assistant United States Attorney Steven W. Myhre and Assistant United States Attorneys Kimberly Frayn and Michael Chu.