LANSING — Stuart Dunnings III, Ingham County’s prosecuting attorney for nearly two decades, paid for sex “hundreds of times” with multiple women between 2010 and 2015, according to information released this afternoon by Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette’s office.
Dunnings is facing 15 criminal charges in Ingham, Clinton and Ionia counties. Ten are misdemeanors of engaging services of a prostitute, according to court records, but one count in Ingham County’s 54A District Court is for pandering — enticing another person to become a prostitute — a felony punishable by up to 20 years in prison.
The charges stemmed from a federal investigation into a human trafficking ring based in Michigan, Schuette’s office said in a press release.
Tyrone Smith, the leader of that trafficking ring, pleaded guilty in federal court in November to three counts of sex trafficking girls and women and transporting them across state lines as part of an interstate prostitution ring.
Smith admitted to recruiting one woman in December 2012, providing her with heroin, marketing her for sex online and arranging for men to pay her for sex in Lansing, Chicago and other cities over a two-year period, according to the release. He admitted to doing the same to a 17-year-old girl in December 2014. He is slated for sentencing in April and faces a minimum of 15 years in federal prison.
