The Case of the Bank-Robbing Prostitutes: How a Team of L.A. Hookers Became the "Starlet Bandits"

"[Prostitutes] would call me, because they knew if they went on my phone, they would make money," he says. "It was Sylmar, Glendale, Mission Hills, North Hollywood, Vegas ... I took it way far."

At first, Ana was in the dark. But she caught on when she found condoms in his car. His explanation was that he needed to make money to pay the mortgage and the rent. To keep her happy, he got her a $40,000 Lexus.

He bought himself a $50,000 Escalade and, to Ana's annoyance, a Camry for the prostitutes. He also took them to clubs, ordering bottle service and spending upward of $2,500 a night.

ILLUSTRATION BY TIM GABOR

ILLUSTRATION BY NOAH PATRICK PFARR

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More About

• Mallory Mnichowski
• Kayla Canty
• Palmdale
• Crime
• Crime and Law

He tried to restart his entertainment career. He bought a bunch of expensive video equipment and started shooting a reality show with the prostitutes. He put the footage on MySpace and tried to attract attention by buying banner ads promoting it on the website of Power 106, the hip-hop station. That led nowhere.

It's not clear who thought up the idea of robbing banks, but Danielle Derosier was the first of St. John's prostitutes to give it a try. Asked about it now, she says only, "Everybody in L.A. wants money. That's what this whole thing was about."

On March 25, 2008, Derosier walked into the Bank of America on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood. She wore a baggy, gray sweatshirt and large, dark sunglasses. Her hair was swept back into a bun and she held a phone to her left ear. She did not put it down as she approached the counter.

Without saying a word, she slipped a note to the teller. "Give me all the money in the register," it said. "Quickly."

The teller opened the drawer and pressed the silent alarm. The two exchanged a look, and then Derosier turned and walked out just as calmly as she had walked in, still talking on the phone.

Four months later, she tried again, at a Bank of America in Van Nuys. They had learned something from past mistakes; this time the note was more detailed. "Quickly give me all the money in your till. Do not press the alarm. I have a weapon and I would hate to hurt innocent people."

But she hadn't thought of everything. The teller walked away from the counter and handed the note to a supervisor. Not knowing what else to do, Derosier headed out the door.

The FBI gives repeat bank robbers nicknames in order to keep track of them. They dubbed Derosier the Starlet Bandit because witnesses said she wore "movie-star glasses."

When those robberies didn't work, the group lost interest for a while. But in April 2010, another prostitute, Kadara Kilgo, started lobbying to do one, St. John says.

In a letter from prison, Kilgo, now 23, says that in her years on the streets, she was involved in a number of scams and get-rich-quick schemes. She came to rely on St. John for protection. "I sought out Mr. St. John," she writes. "I called him on more than one occasion when I could no longer make it on my own."

Sometime before, in a botched drug deal, she had been sliced with a box cutter, requiring 23 stitches and leaving a large scar on her back. Also, a john had pulled a knife on her during a trick. She was looking for an easier way to make money.

"I did want to leave prostitution behind," she writes, "so I guess you could say that's one of the driving forces that caused me to turn to a more aggressive form of income."

There would later be a dispute over whether the prostitutes were criminals or victims of exploitation. The arguments mirror the debate over how the justice system should treat prostitution itself.

Kilgo's lawyer, Kim Savo, argues that her youth was a factor (she was 19 at the time). She also was addicted to drugs.

"She was vulnerable," Savo says. "I think she was manipulated and taken advantage of in committing [bank robbery], the same way she was taken advantage of in prostitution. I don't see it as significantly different."

Kilgo, however, says St. John did not manipulate her.

"He never forced anyone to do what they did. He just gave the idea and help set the plan in motion," she writes. "What we did, we did of our own free will. ... I asked to do what I did."

St. John says that he and Kilgo agreed together to rob the bank. They also decided to protect themselves by persuading Mallory Mnichowski to be the one to go inside.

Mnichowski had been working as a prostitute in L.A. but returned home to the Midwest after becoming pregnant. She was reluctant to rob banks, but St. John and Kilgo talked her into it, agreeing to split her travel costs to bring her back.

Mnichowski's lawyer, too, would argue that she had been duped. Tests showed she had "an extremely low level of ability," he argues, and that she was "generally lacking in the ability to make good decisions."

For all the work they put into bringing Mnichowski back to town, St. John believed the robbery would not work. When Mnichowski walked out of the Bank of America with nearly $6,000, the spree began.