• Associated Press via Yahoo, Thursday, March 20, 2008 11:30 AM

The call girl scandal that brought down former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer's has apparently prompted ABC News to greenlight a two-hour prime-time special on prostitution that will include Diane Sawyer at a legal brothel in Nevada. The "20/20" special, set to air Friday at 9 p.m. has been in the works for two years and had been expected to air in May or June before ABC moved it up.

Says David Sloan, executive producer of ABC's newsmagazines, "It has taken a lot of time, and I think it's going to be very provocative." In the special, Sawyer interviews sex workers in poor neighborhoods around Philadelphia and in Nevada's legal brothels. ABC also hurriedly set up interviews with high-rent hookers in the wake of the Spitzer scandal.

"Much of the coverage on prostitution is as a cultural phenomenon, when it's really about human beings in crisis," says Sawyer. "There is a lot of denial about the suffering these women experience." Sloan adds that the special is structured so that most of the more titillating material runs in the second hour, but it won't be lurid and "we're very proud of it."

Read the whole story at Associated Press via Yahoo »