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Senator Vitter is escorted out of the Guiliani camp...

Senator apologises for past sins after his phone number is posted on escort agency website


Ewen MacAskill in Washington
Wednesday July 11, 2007
The Guardian


A US senator has been forced to issue a public apology after being exposed in an escort agency case.
David Vitter's telephone number was among thousands posted on Monday on the website of Deborah Jeane Palfrey, who was accused in court of running a prostitution ring. She claims she was running a legitimate escort service.

In April, Randall Tobias, deputy secretary of state, resigned after being named, but he said he had only had massages.

Senator Vitter, a Republican from Louisiana, said in a statement issued by his office: "This was a very serious sin in my past for which I am, of course, completely responsible. Several years ago, I asked for and received forgiveness from God and my wife in confession and marriage counselling.
"Out of respect for my family, I will keep my discussion of the matter there - with God and them. But I certainly offer my deep and sincere apologies to all I have disappointed and let down in any way."

Ms Palfrey, 51, nicknamed the DC Madam by the US media, said yesterday she could not recall him. "I had no idea who this man was," she said.

Mr Vitter, 46, who lives with his wife and four children in Louisiana, was elected to the Senate in 2004. His office said he had used the escort agency three years before running for the Senate. He is not facing re-election until 2010 by which time the electorate may have largely forgotten this.

Earlier this year Ms Palfrey offered to sell her telephone numbers to the media but was blocked by the court. Having won a court battle to have the ban lifted, she posted the numbers on her website.

Given she says that her business was legitimate, her lawyer, Montgomery Blair Sibley, said: "I'm stunned that someone would be apologising for this."

Mr Vitter, who was educated at Harvard and Oxford, where he was a Rhodes scholar, was accused during his bid for the Senate of having had a lengthy affair with a prostitute in New Orleans. In a radio interview at the time, he said it was "absolutely and completely untrue" and dismissed it as "just crass Louisiana politics".

Last year he opposed amending the constitution to ban same sex marriages. He was among the first senators to back Rudy Giuliani's bid for the presidency and offered to act as his southern region campaign organiser.