N o wonder it went viral. In March 2024, Fox 10 broke a salacious story that seemed, perhaps literally, ripped from pop culture. A lawsuit filed by patrons of three Valley strip clubs — Dream Palace in Tempe and Skin Cabaret and Bones Cabaret in Scottsdale, all situated along Scottsdale Road — claimed that dancers were drug- ging scores of customers and racking up six-figure charges on their credit cards. Speaking anonymously, with their faces obscured or darkened, two alleged victims told the news station that they believed they had fallen prey to the same scheme portrayed in the 2019 film “Hustlers,” which starred Jennifer Lopez as one of several New York City strippers who, well, drugged wealthy clients and ran up their credit cards to the max. Neither man could prove he’d been drugged, but each claimed that he was escorted to semi-private VIP rooms, where they experienced extreme impairment. One man described “symptoms not related to alcohol, something else that made me acquiesce and go along to what they seemed to be pushing.” A month later, Fox 10 followed up with an interview with one of the club’s former dancers, whose iden- tity also was concealed. She’d seen men drugged, she said, their champagne spiked with “roofies.” At the time, there were 20 men telling similar stories in the lawsuit filed by Phoenix attorney Rod Galarza. The complaint, which is still winding its way through Maricopa County Superior Court, now boasts more than 40 plaintiffs, with the total amount of allegedly bogus charges exceeding $2.3 million. The Fox 10 story generated a host of second-wave news stories about allegedly shady doings at the clubs. And then…nothing. In 2024, the Scottsdale Police Department told Fox 10 that the accusa- tions were part of an “ongoing investiga- tion” into the clubs. And yet no charges were ever filed in the case, and no charges appear likely to ever be filed. Scottsdale police presented the case to the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office and the Arizona Attorney General’s Office for prosecution, only to have both decline the case because, in the words of spokespersons for both agencies, “there was no reasonable likeli- hood of conviction.” A spokesperson for the Attorney General’s Office added that the investigation’s claims “lacked sufficient evidence.” Though Galarza’s lawsuit persists, records show that if drugging was really going on at the clubs, Scottsdale police didn’t try very hard to sniff it out. Scottsdale investigators didn’t speak to any dancers working at the clubs, didn’t search the club for drugs and didn’t send in undercover cops. Former club employees who did talk to police reported no direct knowledge of any drugging scheme. It raises the question: If all of this illicit, shanghai-style drugging and thievery was going on, why didn’t Scottsdale police bust the joints and close them down? That question is addressed in a new lawsuit filed last month on behalf of Todd Borowsky, who owns the Skin and Bones clubs. (Borowsky is the brother of Scottsdale Mayor Lisa Borowsky, though she was not yet in office when Scottsdale police first touted its investigation.) Filed March 20 in federal court, the suit names the city of Scottsdale, the police department and several individual cops as defendants, accusing them of perpetrating a vindictive sham investigation against the clubs. A spokesperson for the Scottsdale Police Department declined to comment. Borowsky’s suit claims — and records obtained by Phoenix New Times show — that Scottsdale police never found evidence of wrongdoing, much less that anyone was actually slipped a Mickey. And according to the Scottsdale cops’ own reports, Borowsky’s clubs went to great lengths to document their clients’ pricey forays into VIP rooms, requiring signed contracts, a fingerprint and even a photo of the customer holding up the paperwork for each transaction. New Times has obtained several of these photos. The reams of documents and exhibits backing up the suit make clear that if there was any truth to the allegations of criminal drugging and credit card mugging, the Scottsdale Police Department’s shoddy investigation screwed the proverbial pooch, overlooking exculpatory evidence and repeatedly avoiding no-brainer inves- tigative techniques. And though the cops couldn’t prove that any dancers were misusing clients’ credit cards, that didn’t stop a Scottsdale investigator from figura- tively reaching into the clubs’ purses and messing with their bank accounts. Borowsky’s complaint insists his clubs were targeted for a takedown and have lost business as a result of a cop conspiracy to run him out of Scottsdale, and his complaint offers plenty of corroboration for this assertion. Whether or not Scottsdale police were attempting to retal- iate against Borowsky for past conflicts remains unresolved. Todd Borowsky owns both Skin and Bones cabarets in Scottsdale. (Benjamin Leatherman) Strip club owner Todd Borowsky. (Jim Louvau) Strip Search Strip Search How Scottsdale cops botched a probe into an alleged ‘Hustlers‘-style strip club drugging scheme. BY STEPHEN LEMONS
