Big Trouble

Online communities have become home base for the escort industry. In Denver, users of The Other Board (www.theotherboard.com) post info about recent busts by law enforcement (LE), rank adult-service providers (ASP), and trade tips on where johns (known here as "clients" or "hobbyists") can get checked for STDs on the sly. Escort services like Haney's post on these boards while also slipping in advertisements alongside those for legitimate adult services in publications ranging from Westword to Dex, whose current edition lists a total of 224 services with names like Castle Rock Cuties, Erotic Remedies and Zexy Blondes. The vast majority of these are small outfits that use multiple names to generate more calls, while others are "independents," with the escort fielding her own calls. Only a handful are bigger businesses with more than a dozen females working for them.

Haney saw that, and felt there was an untapped market for top-tier escorts. Using the media and business skills he'd polished at Go-Go, he sought only premium females who could go for $250 to $300 per hour. He expected them to be on time and conduct themselves in a professional manner -- after all, he considered himself a businessman who just happened to be in the business of fulfilling sexual fantasies. The more reputable his agency, the more high-paying clients it would attract -- and the more bucks an escort would get for her bang.

Haney knew that the type of consumer most likely to patronize an upscale sex service would be attracted by a sharp web presence, so he built an elaborate website and filled it with pictures and statistics about each of his escorts. He promised his clients complete confidentiality.

Within a year, Haney's Colorado Companions was the biggest escort agency in the Rocky Mountains, operating around the clock, seven days a week, with more than a dozen employees.

"He had changed the whole industry for Denver," says one former business associate. "Kind of made it more upscale, kind of made it nicer. He tried to be, like, the Playboy of escort companies."

Colorado Companions "was the premier elite service," April remembers. "We were the first ones to get pics on the web. The business was always there. I didn't have any downtime." Within a few weeks of starting, she was making $3,000 to $5,000 a week and working close to forty hours. That Christmas, Haney gave all of his employees expensive gift baskets filled with posh body lotions and powder puffs.

Escort appointments could be reserved by the hour, or even by the weekend; clients would leave the money as a "tip" on a dish or tray by the door. Escorts got to keep two-thirds of the money, with a third going to the agency. And at the end of every day, the girls were required to make their drop to Haney.

"After I worked for him for a while, I wouldn't make my drop every day," April says. "I would drop every couple days, and he was fine with that."

Haney "raised the bar" on what was expected of a well-run agency, according to one associate. In the beginning, Colorado Companions operated out of Haney's home, where "phone girls" would answer calls from 9 a.m. to 3 a.m. Haney's employees learned how to work the phones right; their job was to make potential clients feel comfortable, and to also make sure they weren't cops. And a nearby hotel made arranging meetings easy.

April remembers Haney as "all business" in those days, and says he took many measures to ensure his employees' safety when they went on the rare outcall.

Even though she was happy with the money, April quit in February 2001, after just a few months on the job, when her marriage became too chaotic.

Haney quickly filled her position and soon added a dozen more employees. By 2003, he was buying full-page ads in Buzz magazine, a glossy successor to Go-Go, touting his agency as "prompt and discreet," with three in-call locations spread throughout the city and beauties by the names of Hazie, Taj and Maya. Sometimes the girls actually looked like their pictures; sometimes the glamour shots resulted from the photographer's clever use of angles and lighting.

Now living in a nice loft in the Baker neighborhood, Haney had found business success, but he still craved legitimacy. Larry Flynt might be a self-proclaimed smut-peddling scumbag, but his offices were corporate and his business on the up-and-up. Haney, by comparison, was still relegated to the shadows because of the nature of his adult-entertainment niche.

He decided to get away from the life, and headed for Costa Rica with plans to retire there and explore his spiritual side. He was curious about Eastern religions and had a tattoo of the Buddha etched on his back. He'd gone to the Burning Man festival and taken pictures of the freaky, naked revelers cavorting in swirls of gray dust. He'd always hoped that the path of excess might lead to the palace of wisdom -- and now it seemed that the palace might be a tropical paradise.