February 2008 assignation with Spitzer On February 13, 2008, Dupré travelled by
Amtrak from
New York Penn Station to
Washington, D.C., for an assignation at the
Mayflower Hotel with New York governor
Eliot Spitzer. The arrangements had been made by phone between Spitzer and a booker at
Emperors Club VIP, and were monitored by federal investigators who had initiated a
wiretap after his bank had filed a
suspicious activity report regarding money transfers by Spitzer to a front company operated by the escort service. Caught on the FBI's wiretap was Dupré's response to the booker's mention of other escorts' difficulties with Spitzer. "I don't think he's difficult," said Dupré. "I mean it's just kind of like, whatever, I'm here for a purpose. I know what my purpose is. I am not a … moron, you know what I mean." On March 6, federal authorities arrested four individuals involved with Emperors Club VIP, charging them under federal
prostitution and
money laundering laws. Initial news reports and court documents did not identify the agency's clients or call girls by name, referring to Spitzer as "Client 9" and to Dupré as "Kristen". On March 10,
The New York Times identified Spitzer as "Client 9." Two days later on March 12, the
Times identified Dupré as "Kristen." Dupré's only public comment was a brief interview with
The New York Times for the March 12 story that revealed her identity. "I just don't want to be thought of as a monster," Dupré told the newspaper. "This has been a very difficult time. It's complicated."
Aftermath apartment building the day after Spitzer's resignation Dupré remained in seclusion in the days after her role in the scandal became public, and became the subject of increasingly intense media coverage.
The Village Voice called her "the most famous hooker in America". Dupré was reportedly offered
US$1 million by
Hustler magazine to pose nude, and received offers from
Penthouse magazine and
Vivid Entertainment. On March 19, the
soft porn website
Girls Gone Wild featured teasers of Dupré, shot in
Miami Beach, Florida, in 2003 before she had turned 18. Dupré presented the company the drivers license of a New Jersey woman named Amber Arpaio, Company founder
Joe Francis—who served a year in jail for a conviction of child abuse and prostitution involving filming two underaged girls in
Panama City, Florida, in 2003 who had represented themselves as adults—prepared to release a full DVD of Dupré footage from company archives. "All nude images of Ms. Dupre were taken in public places and contain no sexual contact," said Francis. "In Florida, where Ms. Dupre was filmed, the law allows even women under the age of 18 to be filmed nude with their consent." Dupré's attorney, Don Buchwald, argued in an e-mail to Girls Gone Wild, "It was because she was underage that [Francis] sent her home on a Greyhound bus back to North Carolina. It would be outrageous at the very least to play the video of an underage female on the Internet." On April 28, 2008, Dupré filed suit against Francis and two of his companies alleging their exploitation of Dupré's name and image, seeking
US$10 million in punitive damages, but in July of that year she decided to drop the suit after Francis released footage showing her agreeing to be filmed. In December 2009, Dupré started writing an advice column in the
New York Post called "Ask Ashley". Her last column appeared in May 2012. In January 2010, Dupré appeared on
The Howard Stern Show, where she discussed incidents ranging from her situation as a rape victim to how she preoccupied her mind when engaged in intercourse with men she was not attracted to. Dupré posed nude for the May 2010 issue of
Playboy magazine.
Legal proceedings On March 15, 2008, Dupré was granted
immunity from prosecution by the
United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York for her role in the
Spitzer scandal, in order to testify at court hearings related to the
Emperors Club VIP prostitution ring. In July 2008, a woman named Amber Arpaio filed a federal lawsuit against Dupré for
defamation and
invasion of privacy, claiming Dupré used her lost driver's license to appear on a
Girls Gone Wild video. Arpaio also sued Girls Gone Wild founder
Joe Francis. ==Music career==