Mayor Kasim Reed’s office is investigating the use of an Atlanta fire station for photos reportedly advertising escort services.
The images, which depict multiple women posing provocatively in front of a fire truck and wearing Atlanta Fire Rescue gear, appeared on the website Backpage Georgia.
Backpage, an online classifieds portal, has been accused of facilitating sex trafficking.
Channel 2 Action News located advertisements, listed as recently as Sunday, of a woman striking risque poses at an Atlanta fire station. The caption reads “Absolutely Astonishing” and “vip service available all night.” The ad states that the woman is 22 years old.
WXIA also found online ads for escort services depicting women posing suggestively. Channel 2 reports that the images were taken at station No. 2 on Jonesboro Road in southeast Atlanta.
A spokeswoman for Reed’s office said the women in the photos are not city employees. The mayor’s office has launched an internal investigation into the matter, spokeswoman Anne Torres said.
Stephen Borders, president of the Atlanta Professional Firefighters union, said fire stations typically have an open door policy for residents who want to tour the facilities and take pictures.
Borders said that under former Fire Chief Kelvin Cochran, the department was trained to welcome curious residents, provided they follow guidelines such as not posting political messages and are properly dressed.
“If they wanted to come in and squirt water with the hose, we let them squirt water with the hose. If they wanted a ride on the firetruck, we’d drive them around on the firetruck,” Borders said, adding: Cochran “was very customer service-based.”
The union leader said he hasn’t spoken with the firefighters involved in the incident, but has been told that no firefighters took the images and that someone halted the photo session once he or she realized it had become lewd.
He hopes no one loses his or her job from the incident.
“I haven’t done a thorough investigation, but from what I’ve seen, there was nothing that crossed either a legal line or ethical line. There was no nudity, nothing that is kind of forbidden as far as pictures,” he said. “It may have been in poor taste, but I don’t get to pass judgment on the citizens and taste in the city.”
The ads appear to have been removed.
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