![Stormy Daniels speaks during a ceremony for her receiving a City Proclamation and Key to the City on Wednesday, May 23, 2018 in West Hollywood, Calif. [Ringo H.W. Chiu / AP]](https://npr.brightspotcdn.com/dims4/default/4c2abd2/2147483647/strip/true/crop/900x675+0+0/resize/840x630!/format/webp/quality/90/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnpr-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2Flegacy%2Fimages%2Fnews%2Fnpr%2F2019%2F08%2F747083338_1657757881.jpg)
Columbus Police is departmentally charging five former Vice Unit officers over the 2018 arrest of porn star Stormy Daniels.
Interim Police Chief Tom Quinlan announced the charges in a video on Wednesday. The department has not named the officers involved.
“The five officers from the now-disbanded Vice section who are being departmentally charged this week include a commander, a lieutenant, a sergeant and two of the arresting officers,” Quinlan says in the video. "These officers violated our rules of conduct. The range of discipline for these officers can include a reprimand, a suspension, demotion, and or termination."
Daniels was arrested during her appearance at the strip club Sirens on July 11, 2018. Along with Miranda Panda and Brittany Walters, Daniels was charged with violating Ohio’s “Community Defense Act,” which prohibits “nude or semi-nude” dancers from touching patrons.
Timeline: Investigation Of Columbus Police Vice Unit
Columbus City Attorney Zach Klein later dropped charges against all three women, while recommending police stop enforcing the “Community Defense Act.”
According to a press release, each of the charged officers will receive a hearing, after which Quinlan will make a recommendation for disciplinary action. Based on that recommendation, Columbus' Director of Public Safety will make the ultimate decision about suspensions, demotions or terminations.
"Because of pending litigation as well as a concurrent federal criminal investigation, I will not elaborate further on our investigations findings at this time,” Quinlan says.
Daniels has filed a federal civil rights lawsuits against the department. She alleges officers were “politically motivated” to arrest her in retaliation for her lawsuit against President Trump over a 2016 hush payment.
Another federal lawsuit filed by Panda and Walters also claims political motivation. That lawsuit was settled by Columbus City Council in January.
An internal investigation by Columbus Police found the arrests were “improper”but were not pre-planned or politically motivated. The Internal Affairs probe, which concluded in April, focused on Vice officers Steven Rosser, Whitney Lancaster, Shana Keckley and Mary Praither.
Since the FBI launched its own investigation into the Vice Unit in September, three detectives were removed from duty, including Rosser and Lancaster. The third, Andrew Mitchell, has been indicted on federal and local charges.
Quinlan disbanded the Vice Unit entirely in March. As part of an organization-wide restructuring, Quinlan recently announced the unit would be replaced by the Police And Community Together team (PACT).
“My analysis in disbanding the Vice Unit was that we had a failure of leadership there, a failure of supervision, so we had to fix that weakness or that vulnerability, and this Police And Community Together Team has done that,” Quinlan said earlier this month.
If you have information to share about the Vice Unit, contact WOSU at adora@wosu.org.
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