Two employees of the Drug Enforcement Administration have been charged with making false statements for not disclosing connections to an adult entertainment business, federal authorities said Wednesday.
David Polos, until recently an assistant special agent who oversaw the Organized Crime and Drug Enforcement Strike Force, lent the club owners $50,000 and had an option to formally purchase an ownership stake in Twin Plus Go-Go Lounge in South Hackensack, New Jersey, the criminal complaint said. Glen Glover, an information technology specialist, was part owner since 2010, the complaint said
Both men had submitted national security forms in 2011 in which they did not mention the strip club, the complaint said.
“David Polos and Glen Glover had important and sensitive law enforcement jobs with the DEA,” Manhattan U.S. Attorney Bharara said. “They also had other secret jobs, which they concealed from DEA in order to maintain their national security clearance, betraying the oaths they had taken and creating needless risk for the agency they worked for.”
The government wants to know about outside employment, especially work “with the proximity to crime,” because of risk of blackmail, the U.S. Attorney’s office said in a press release. If the men had revealed their connection to the club, they probably would have been denied the security clearance necessary to perform their DEA jobs, the government said.
Both men worked regular shifts at the club and sometimes handled business matters on DEA time, the complaint said. Glover was generally in charge of running the club and Polos handled the liquor, the complaint said.
The men knew that club dancers, some who were undocumented immigrants from Latin America and Russia, engaged in sex with club patrons and staff in private stalls, the complaint said.
Polos and Glover were not charged with any prostitution-related crimes, but prostitution has been an issue with DEA employees lately.
In March, a Justice Department inspector general report found DEA agents in foreign postings attended sex parties with prostitutes paid for by drug cartels, among other indiscretions.
Last month, then-Attorney General Eric Holder warned all Justice Department employees — including DEA agents — about soliciting prostitutes, saying it “threatens the core mission of the department.”
The criminal complaint said Polos made it known to other club employees that he worked in law enforcement and sometimes wore his DEA badge. During one argument with a co-manager’s wife, Polos lifted up a pants leg, pointed to a pistol in an ankle holster and said, “This is the boss. I am the boss,” the complaint said.
Glover wore a bulletproof vest to the club on more than one occasion, the complaint said.
Polos, 51, of West Nyack, New York, left DEA employment last month and Glover, 45, of Lyndhurst, New Jersey, is still employed with the agency, the complaint said. They could not be reached for comment.
They are each charged with one count of making false statements. If convicted, they could be sentenced to a maximum sentence of five years in prison.