Her name was Alice and she paced the downtown corner in Daisy Dukes. She met the stares of men in cars who slowed to take second looks and then third ones. Hands stuffed deep into the pockets of a leather coat, she smiled thinly like a lady who might want you to stop and chat her up.

Go ahead, Romeo. Pull over to the curb. There are a few $10 bills in your wallet with no place to go and you’ve got time to kill. Why not stop and see what adventures might be purchased?

Fool! That come-hither look you thought was just for you was in fact professionally positioned upon her face. Alice came equipped with hidden microphones, a badge in her pocket and cohorts waiting around the corner with handcuffs just right for your wrists.

And not handcuffs in a good way.

Those were the days of prostitution stings in Lewiston and my, the fishing was hot. With decoy hookers scattered across the downtown, police would reel them in left and right.

The stings always produced surprises. A priest, a probation officer, a school teacher and several businessmen found shame one seamy summer when they thought they were buying affection by the hour.

Later, as ink was being pressed onto paper in the newsroom, some of the men would wander in from the parking lot. They were pale and clutching hats in fidgeting fingers. They wanted to speak to the highest ranking editor in the building and they did so in trembling voices that cracked with the tears of the doomed.

They wanted their names kept out of the story, of course, but it was never done. They talked about how their jobs would be gone, their families too, if word of these transgressions hit the streets. They were told that a news story is only honest and fair if it treats each subject the same, regardless of his station in life.

I always felt a sickening compassion for these men as they stood clutching their hats and telling their sad stories to unbending editors. I wrote the stories and included the names, but that cringing sense of empathy was there the entire night.

And here, the Always Angry Reader will start writing a furious letter, demanding to know how I can muster sympathy for such loathsome criminals. But don’t be like that, love. I know prostitution is not a victimless crime. But I also know that the morning after a sting must be hell for the accused. Heck, maybe that’s why they call it a sting.

I picture the condemned man sitting across the table from his bride of 25 years, in convulsions of terror as she flips through the newspaper.

“Don’t you want to skip the local section, Honeydew? Maybe skip all that ugly crime news and go right for the comics? Here! Let’s go out shopping and let me buy you something that sparkles!”

But it’s no good. If Honeydew didn’t learn of the vile deed through a beautifully written news story, she would hear it from a neighbor or a friend at the salon. The moment of reckoning must have been terrible, a thousand lame excuses pin-balling through the head.

“I can explain! I only offered 40 of my sweaty dollars to the lass because I wanted to buy her coat! Yes! Her fine leather coat, which would have made such a nice gift for you on our anniversary which is just eight short months away. You see? I did it for you, Honeydew!”

Sounds of frying pan striking skull, clothes being hurled into the yard and locks being changed.

Freaky times, those days of prostitution stings. But you don’t see them so much anymore in Lewiston. For this I blame the Internet, which has provided easier and more private forms of shopping for all wares, from toaster ovens to topless window washers.

Sometimes it’s fun (I’m told) to browse Craigslist just to see what might be had with that tax-relief check. Here, a potter’s wheel for $350. There, a sofa that looks like the one Peter Griffin sits on in “The Family Guy.”

But click a link just a few inches away and you will find services/erotic, where the people who used to walk the downtown streets are hanging out their shingles. Nadia will meet at her place or yours for a fee to be discussed later. A blonde named Ashley offers a money-back guarantee that the photos she posted are really of her. Amber claims to be a hottie with a body that she will share with you for the low, low price of $200 an hour.

The online hooker trade is thriving, though police are starting to hang out there, too. A young lady was pinched in Cumberland County just last week for such a thing, which will send tremors of unease through the hooker-shopping populace.

Or maybe it won’t. After all, isn’t the risk part of the allure of the sex trade? It’s like “Let’s Make a Deal,” where behind door No. 1 is Rachel with her full services; behind door No. 2 is some snarling cop and a lifetime of making up weak excuses for your arrest.

Me, I shop Craigslist without guilt or any need to fidget with my hat before a frowning editor. I’m only there for the sofas, my friend. How cool would it be to own a replica of that famed couch from “The Family Guy?”

You can always find a used couch at the online auction sites these days. It used to be that searching for such a thing would entail prowling the downtown, waiting for one to appear as a castaway at curbside.

Kind of ironic, isn’t it?

Mark LaFlamme is the Sun Journal crime reporter. You can e-mail him at mlaflamme@sunjournal.com.