Aunt hires prostitutes for 12-year-old nephew

August 24, 2007

In Donora, Pennsylvania a woman is being accused of hiring two prostitutes last November to have sex with her 12-year-old nephew. Police said details began to surface just this month.

The boy's mother said, "My anger is out of control." The mother's name was not released to protect the boy's identity and privacy.

However, police said the boy's 36-year-old aunt, Linda Van Pool, is being charged with soliciting prostitution, corruption of a minor, and endangering the welfare of a child.

The boy's mother reportedly is a bartender in Donora. She says Van Pool came to the bar asking for eighty dollars for the boy. The mother says she never thought the money would be used for prostitutes. She said, "I just thought he would call his grandmother and wind up spending it at Wal-Mart or wherever...I didn't know that she would take him to those type of women. I didn't think they existed in this area. I thought you had to go to Pittsburgh for that."

Van Pool reportedly took the boy to two separate locations.

Police said the 12-year-old's father had died a short time ago and that the child was "acting up", so the sex was thought to be "a way to appease the boy."

Van Pool has been placed in the Washington County Correctional Facility on $5,000 bond. The two prostitutes have not been arrested, but police expect that their arrests will come shortly.