More at: https://www.fox19.com/2020/04/05/none-it-is-true-portsmouth-attorney-under-state-investigation-speaks-out/
PORTSMOUTH, Ohio (FOX19) - A Portsmouth lawyer and former city council member under state investigation is linked to prostitution, sex trafficking and the drugs, federal court records show.
Federal authorities received complaints for years about Michael Mearan, 74, according to a 2015 affidavit filed under seal with the Southern District of Ohio that FOX19 NOW obtained.
Agents with Ohio Bureau of Investigation recently raided his home, which also serves as his office and is across the street from the Scioto County Courthouse.
Mearan has not been charged and in an interview with FOX19 NOW, he categorically denied all allegations.
“It would be a frustrating job to investigate me because I lead kind of a boring life getting up every morning and going across the street to work and going to the jail to visit my clients,” he said.
Federal court records obtained by FOX19 NOW, however, tell a different story.
Mearan was suspected of supplying young female prostitutes with drugs “in exchange for and as an incentive to participate in acts of prostitution," a copy of the August 2015 affidavit shows.
A federal agent filed it under seal to get permission for a wiretap in a drug case involving one of Mearan’s former clients, according to a copy of it.
The sworn statement contends some of the women said they were sent as far as New York, New Jersey, Florida and Nevada for paid sexual encounters.
Portsmouth defense attorney Michael Mearan sits on his front porch during a search of his home and office on Wednesday, March 25, 2020.
Portsmouth defense attorney Michael Mearan sits on his front porch during a search of his home and office on Wednesday, March 25, 2020. (Source: Liz Dufour/Cincinnati Enquirer)
Megan Lancaster was 25 when she was last seen on April 3, 2013. Portsmouth police tell FOX19 NOW they have no suspects or persons of interest in the case and fear it's more serious than a missing person's case.
Megan Lancaster was 25 when she was last seen on April 3, 2013. Portsmouth police tell FOX19 NOW they have no suspects or persons of interest in the case and fear it's more serious than a missing person's case. (Source: Finding Megan Lancaster Facebook page)
According to the affidavit, Mearan was connected to more than two dozen women who worked for him as prostitutes, including one who has been missing for seven years as of Friday, and another found dead of “multiple traumas."
What’s more, Mearan has been known to law enforcement in Portsmouth for more than 40 years and has been indirectly tied to multiple prior FBI investigations into human trafficking, extortion, violent gangs and “White Slave Trafficking," the court record reads.
“Numerous complaints have been received and, subsequently, documented by the FBI Portsmouth office and FBI/HIDTA/Southern Ohio Drug Task Force (SODTF) relative to this criminal activity,” the affidavit states. "Also, witnesses and source-information interviews have indicated that Mearan offers his legal services, clothing residence, food, etc., to females in return for them becoming prostitutes for him and conducting sexual acts for his clients including a Portsmouth, Ohio judge, Southern Ohio Correctional Facility Staff members, and local businessmen.
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