news»The Daily Weekly No question, McGinn inherited a woeful economy, but he made things worse by alienating the business community, the city council, and even exGov. Chris Gregoire, whom he essentially called a liar regarding the tunnel. As Times columnist Danny Westneat wrote, “Bottom line: McGinn was a dead man walking, politically speaking. Or I guess dead man bicycling.” McGinn dodges most questions about his stormy tenure. He’s got a script, a positive spin, and he’s sticking to it. “Despite the recession, we’ve expanded support for education, rebuilt the rainy-day fund, while increasing funding for essential services and transit expansion,” he says in his soothing, it’s-a-lovely-day-in-the-neighborhood tone. “We’ve invested $1.68 million to expand the Youth Violence Initiative. We’re building the seawall and we’re investing in our city, in our streets, in our infrastructure.” The mayor, who relished the role of outsider four years ago, has become a developer’s darling. Paul Allen’s Vulcan real estate company, for one, was thrilled that a gung-ho McGinn championed high-density plans to build three 400-foot residential skyscrapers along Denny and two dozen 24-story towers along Fairview and Dexter in South Lake Union. To date, 19 individual Vulcan donors have shown their appreciation by giving McGinn $3,700 for his re-election efforts. McGinn says South Lake Union and similar high-density endeavors are the inevitable future. “We can’t turn back the clock in Seattle,” he says. “We’re building a world-class city.”
The Bust Seattle’s Stripper King Never Felt
Frank would have slapped himself at seeing Panico’s innovation: a drive-in strip joint! It’s Dick’s the way he would have liked it.
S E AT T L E ’ S B E S T D A M N
Police then spent more months on the case. And then just the other day, a cop was accused of crossing the line. That happened a lot when Frank ran Seattle clubs, back in the 1950s and ’60s police-payoff days. A cop walked in and Frank had a sack lunch for him, a salad of cash. Frank could then stay open. In this case, both Panico, 51, and longtime Snohomish County Sheriff ’s Sgt. Darrell O’Neill, 58, were arrested for conspiring to promote prostitution. Everett Police claim O’Neill tipped off Panico and a manager/dancer about police investigations in return for sex with the women. Investigators say O’Neill allegedly had sex inside the coffee stands while in uniform. There is video of him hugging and kissing the bikini
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baristas on duty. Police claim the coffee huts “essentially operate as drive-through strip clubs or brothels.” The investigation continues, with officials looking into possible money-laundering and organized-crime violations. Charges like that would also be right out of the Frank Colacurcio racketeering playbook. Which brings up one final point: Frank, as a strip-club mentor, could tell Panico about: going to jail. Seven felonies, one reversed. He was an expert. RICK ANDERSON E
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The owner of the alleged drive-through brothels learned from the best.
MYEVERETTNEWS.COM
Stripper King Frank Colacurcio, who died three years ago last week, resides now in the great hereafter. Wherever that is, they likely do not have newspapers. Still, you could imagine applause from above when news broke about his protégé Carmela Panico. She had danced for him at Rick’s, his nudie strip club in Lake City, going on to become one of the few female entrepreneurs in the strip-andsex business. Panico followed Frank’s model— create a small empire of joints and then battle the cops to stay alive. With one obvious difference: Panico thought small. Rather than dance halls, her clubs are the size of coffee shacks. In fact, they are espresso huts, six of them scattered around Snohomish County and one in Kent. The cops call them sexpresso stands. Besides a cuppa joe, a customer can get wiggled at and flash-danced. According to police and prosecutors, some of the grinding baristas also allowed the touching of body parts, occasionally letting it all hang out the window. Sometimes, allegedly, they offered sex for money. Frank would have slapped himself at seeing Panico’s innovation: a drive-in strip joint! It’s Dick’s the way he would have liked it. Panico, like Frank, has been fighting with the cops for years. In 2011, according to court records, a plainclothes officer said that when he drove up to one of Panico’s huts, Java Juggs, the barista asked “Are you a naughty boy?” He confessed he was. The barista told him to drive around to the other side of the stand where, through the window, he could watch her on the
stripper pole, exposing herself. A frothy cup of coffee like that cost $20. At those prices, the think-small strip clubs were revenue-large: In the past three years, Panico deposited more than $850,000 in cash into a BECU bank account, records show. It was literally cool cash—but something smelled. A search warrant on file recounts that BECU employees noticed the money always seemed to have a “foul odor.” That’s because, Panico advised her employees, she kept the money “in her freezer at home with fish.” Police spent tireless months on the case—pole dance after pole dance; oh, the humanity. Panico was subsequently charged with prostitution. She later pleaded guilty to lewd conduct and was fined $775.
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