A convicted felon who was once a popular minister and Hartford activist is behind bars again.
Police say the former Reverend Henry Price is back to his old tricks pimping homeless drug addicts as prostitutes.
The clerk at the Roberts Street Ramada Inn in East Hartford called police about a stream of men coming and going from Room 212 Tuesday, telling cops of two women coming to the lobby every now and then to give money to a man later identified as Henry Price.
Police talked to the women and say they found one had empty heroin bags and needles, with “obvious signs of i-v drug use: scabs over much of her arms.” Officers say both women admitted Price was their pimp, that he advertised them on local websites and set up rendezvous in hotel rooms.
The on-line ads really the only main difference from the claims that sent Price to prison in 2002 for eight years, prosecutors then saying he abused, had sex and gave cash to prostitutes to buy drugs.
Allegations he at first denied saying his work as a vocal critic of Hartford Police made him a target, “I’m definitely not guilty of any of the charges.”
Price spent time in prison back in the 1980’s for murdering a drug dealer who gave him low-grade cocaine. He was pardoned in the 1990’s, became a minister and community activist working with ex-offenders until returning to prison in 2002.
Bail for these latest charges of promoting prostitution is set at $500,000.