GREAT FALLS – A former Great Falls mayor accused of promoting prostitution at the bar and strip club he owns west of the city has reached a plea agreement.
Gayle Morris, 64, was set to go to trial in June on a charge of promoting prostitution at Really Windy’s bar, but in court documents filed this week he agreed to instead plead no contest to amended misdemeanor counts of obstructing a peace officer and accountability to prostitution.
Morris did not return a phone message left for him at Really Windy’s on Friday afternoon, and prosecutors could not be reached for comment.
The deal recommends that Morris be sentenced to six-month-suspended sentences for each count and pay a total of $1,000 in fines. The sentences would be consecutive.
Prosecutors have said illegal sexual activity took place on the dance stage at the bar, but mostly in a curtained-off lap-dance room. Officers who searched Really Windy’s in May 2009 say they discovered used condoms and condom wrappers in couch cushions of the lounge’s lap-dance room.
Morris, who was elected mayor in 1992 and served until 1995, is set to change his plea June 3.