http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=KVI2FT2FLZXO1QFI
QMGSFFWAVCBQWIV0?xml=/news/2008/01/26/whooker126.xml
Hookers for Jesus: Ex sex-workers save souls
By Philip Sherwell in Las Vegas
Last Updated: 3:56pm GMT 26/01/2008
Las Vegas used to be a lucrative haunt for Annie Lobert, a $500-a-day
escort girl, and Heather Veitch, a highly-remunerated stripper.
In Pictures: Hookers for Jesus
Now the vivacious double act patrol the city's neon-lit streets with
a dramatically different mission - to save souls rather than sell
their bodies.
Former sex industry workers Annie Lobert (r) of Hookers for Jesus and
Heather Veitch (l) from JC's Girls
With their peroxide blond hair, contour-hugging outfits, and
surgically-enhanced chests, they do not look so different from their
former incarnations in the city's notorious sex industry.
But the strategically-located message adorning their tight black T-
shirts gives away their new mission - as born-again Christians.
Embossed in gaudy pink, the word "Hookers" appears above the
Christian symbol of the fish across Ms Lobert's chest, while Ms
Veitch's shirt bears the legend "Holy Hotties".
Through their two groups, "Hookers for Jesus" and "JC's Girls", they
perform what is arguably America's most unusual Christian outreach
operation, aimed at their former colleagues.
advertisement"The girls can relate to who we are and how we look in a
way that they can't with some of the typical frumpy Christians who
come here," said Ms Lobert, 40. "We don't preach to them and we're
not judgmental. We tell them that God loves them, even if they are
hookers or strippers or porn stars. We offer help and advice - we do
whatever we can for them."
The Sunday Telegraph accompanied the women - who have become internet
sensations with a YouTube video series, "Saving Sex City", and
popular MySpace pages and blogs - as they spread their message at
events like Las Vegas's Adult Entertainment Expo.
The annual international gathering of the porn industry might sound
like enemy territory, but Ms Lobert and Ms Veitch were among old
friends as they caught up on gossip, exchanged beauty tips and handed
out cards, apparently inured to the risque material dominating huge
flat-screen televisions in the convention hall.
"We love what they do," said Mary Carey, a self-styled "adult
megastar" who has prayed with Ms Veitch.
"They are there when the girls need them. I don't consider myself a
sinner, I'm not harming anyone and porn is really just free speech.
But it's good that Annie and Heather are doing their thing."
The bustling three-day Expo, which attracted about 40,000 visitors,
is a clear illustration of how the adult entertainment world has left
behind its red-light roots of tacky cinemas and trashy magazines and
burgeoned into a multibillion-dollar hi-tech multi-media business.
But the usual milieu for the women is the city's luxury hotel-
casinos, where they talk with "freelance" prostitutes, and strip
clubs, where they buy lap dances in private rooms so they can chat to
performers.
Ms Lobert, who is funded by donations to her internet site, and Ms
Veitch, who is backed financially by her church, now plan to expand
their work by setting up temporary accomodation for sex trade workers
who want to quit.
They are also developing links with the city police force to help
women in trouble with the law.
Among Ms Lobert's recent converts is Stephanie, 26, who declined to
give her last name.
"I had been a prostitute for six years and I was desperate to get out
for my baby daughter, but I just didn't know how to do it," she
said. "I was looking for information on the internet and I came
across Annie and Hookers for Jesus.
"She was wonderful. She advised me on applying for jobs, let me use
her computer and helped me out with rent money so I didn't have to go
back to the Strip."
Stephanie is a testament to the success of the unusual approach of
Hookers for Jesus: she now works as a front-desk receptionist at a
Vegas hotel and attends Ms Lobert's 2,500-congregation non-
denominational church.
Ms Lobert dragged herself out of her own "dark places" after hitting
rock bottom - she was regularly beaten up by her pimp boyfriend and
later became addicted to drugs.
"I came to Vegas as a young woman from Minnesota who fell in love
with the glamour and excitement but it culminated in an overdose,"
she said. "My life flashed out before my eyes and I realised then
that Jesus had saved my life for a purpose."
They have heard all the jokes about "porn-again Christians" but say
they are happy to use their physical assets to spread the word.
"A lot of guys pose for photos with us and when they go home and look
up what's on our T-shirts, they learn what we're about. We call it
booby-trapping," explained Ms Lobert cheerfully.
But their unapologetically brash looks and refusal to condemn the
lifestyles they have left behind have also earned them opprobrium
from some corners of the born-again world.
"Some Christians think we are just cheap harlots and tell us so, but
to be honest we really don't care," said Ms Lobert.
Her friend Ms Veitch added: "People used to go to Africa to be
missionaries. Well, we're missionaries to the sex industry. That's
our calling."
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