UPDATE 1-Sex scandal passes but Spitzer may face legal woes

(New throughout with quotes from legal experts)

By Emily Chasan

NEW YORK, March 13 (Reuters) - Publicly humiliated after announcing his resignation over a sex scandal, New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer could now be caught in a legal tangle for months, former prosecutors said on Thursday.

If Spitzer really is "Client 9" who patronized an upscale prostitution ring, he could face prosecution for transporting a prostitute across state lines or for structuring money transfers to avoid detection -- or lastly for paying for sex.

Spitzer announced on Wednesday he would step down as governor after The New York Times reported he was a repeat client of the escort service and paid a young woman $1,000 an hour for a rendezvous in a Washington hotel room.

The federal investigation began last year when banks alerted the Internal Revenue Service to Spitzer's suspicious money transfers to shell companies linked to the prostitution ring, the Times said.

That led to the stunning downfall to a man who evoked morality as he pursued malfeasance on Wall Street while attorney general of New York state.

The Times, citing unnamed law enforcement sources, said Spitzer was the unnamed Client 9 from a federal affidavit supporting charges filed last week against four suspected ringleaders of the Emperors Club online prostitution ring.

Spitzer apologized to his family and the public for unspecified offenses, referring to his "private failings."

"I think there's a reasonably strong likelihood that they (prosecutors) would initiate charges, or at least pursue this very seriously at this juncture," said Brad Simon, a former federal prosecutor who now works as a defense attorney at Simon & Partners LLP in New York.

"In his case I'm sure there will be many months of discussion, negotiating and investigating."

'A TOUGH CALL'

While prostitution is illegal in Washington, D.C., as it is in most U.S. states, clients are rarely prosecuted.

But because, authorities say, Client 9 paid for the woman to travel to Washington from New York, he may have violated the Mann Act that bans interstate transport to engage in prostitution.

Silent movie star Charlie Chaplin was famously prosecuted under the Mann Act in 1944 after paying for a train ticket for a woman to meet him in New York, but he was acquitted.

Spitzer's lawyers could argue that the Mann Act's intent was to catch traffickers in prostitution, not clients.