OAKLAND β A year-old prostitute testified Thursday that a former Oakland police officer solicited her for sex after meeting her while he was patrolling an Oakland strip infamous for prostitution and sex trafficking. Walterhouse, 27, is charged with two felony counts of conspiracy to obstruct justice and one misdemeanor court of engaging in prostitution.
Authorities allege he tipped off the woman to undercover prostitution stings in late , weeks after several of his Oakland police colleagues were arrested, fired or otherwise disciplined in connection with a law enforcement sex exploitation scandal centered around the teenage daughter of an Oakland police dispatcher who formerly went by the name Celeste Guap.
Walterhouse resigned from the department last year. Last month, former Oakland officer Brian Bunton, 41, was ordered to stand trial on one felony and one misdemeanor charges related to the teenager after she testified that he told her about an undercover Oakland police prostitution sting after they had oral sex.
She later found out that he lied about the sting. A preliminary hearing for a current Oakland officer accused in connection with the scandal, Giovanni LoVerde, is scheduled for next month but is expected to be continued because of the Walterhouse case. Walterhouse, who patrolled a part of East Oakland that includes International Boulveard, an internationally known hub for sex trafficking, first made contact with the year-old sex worker in while he was patrolling and she was walking the prostitution strip, the woman testified Thursday.
He once was the cover officer for one her arrests, and would frequently say hello before he gave her his number in The woman testified Thursday that Walterhouse met her in a Castro Valley hotel room on the morning of Oct. A few days later, the woman said she was stopped by two Oakland police officers who said they knew about her meeting with Walterhouse at the hotel.
