A Florida sheriff branded an alleged transgender prostitute as being ‘uglier than a mud fence’ as he held up their ‘before and after’ mugshots.
Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd had been parading the results of a recent crackdown by his Florida department which saw nearly 250 people arrested for alleged human trafficking.
One of those was Jason Balthis, a 43-year-old who Sheriff Judd said was charged with ‘offering to commit’ as part of the ‘Fool Around and Find Out’ crackdown.
Holding a picture of Balthis as a woman up, he said: ‘This Jason Balthis, when he walks in you think “well I have set up a deal with an ugly woman”, and I think you’d all agree he’s an ugly woman.’
He then held up a mugshot of Balthis without any makeup on or his wig, showing a bald man with remnants of what appears to be lipstick still on him.
Judd continued: ‘This is what you really get when the makeup comes off. I want you to think about this, you decide you’re gonna hook up with a woman, she comes in and she’s already uglier than a mud fence.
‘Then as you start to engage you find out this dudette is a dude, and look what he really looks like. He looks like he should have been in the Scarface movie.
‘This is what is happening, people think they are getting this, and many times they are getting a really bad guy. This is the before and after.’
He added: ‘When you find them in the bar at night and you try to drink them pretty and you wake up the next morning and you see this, that’s what we call Rolex ugly.’
Sheriff Judd explained: ‘You wake up the next morning and they’re laying on your arm and your Rolex is there.
‘You just chew your arm off and leave the Rolex, you gotta get outta there. You don’t care about the Rolex.’
According to Polk County data, Balthis has been arrested eight times in the past 11 years.
Some charges include possession of drugs including crystal meth and cocaine, violating a probation, and his most recent for alleged prostitution.
His inmate profile states his race and sex as a white male. He is currently being held in custody.
Balthis was one of 244 suspects taken in during the nine-day operation which started earlier this month.
The sheriff’s office said 141 of those suspects were arrested for soliciting a prostitute and traveling to negotiate sex for money.
Another 93 suspects had traveled to commit prostitution, they said, with 10 also arrested for aiding and abetting, transporting or taking proceeds from prostitutes.
Officials said that they believe they had identified four possible human trafficking victims during the investigation.
Combined criminal histories for all of those involved amounted to 400 felonies and 519 misdemeanors for crimes that including attempted murder and sexual assault.
Former NFL linebacker Adadrius Taylor, who had played with the Carolina Panthers and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers was one of those arrested.
Judd said Taylor brought his 6-year-old child with him and left them in his car while he went to meet with who he thought was a prostitute.
He stayed in Florida for his college career, playing for Florida Atlantic, before going unselected in the 2014 Draft.
Taylor then signed a three-year, $1.53million contract with the Carolina Panthers, and went on to play in the NFL for the Panthers and Buccaneers.
After being released by the Panthers for a second time, he switched his focus to the Canadian Football League and signed a deal with the Calgary Stampeders in September 2023.
He was released two months later without playing a game, and has been a free agent since.
Taylor was born Adarius Glanton, but changed his name to honor his father.