Manhattan- A lawyer who fervently contested the result of the 2000 presidential election and started an organization advocating voter reform used it to hide profits from another venture, the police say: a strip club that offered more than dancing.

The lawyer, Louis Posner, [pictured] ran the Hot Lap Dance Club out of a fifth-floor loft in Hell’s Kitchen, where the police said the wealthy clientele paid as much as $5,000 for sex with dancers in private rooms.

The authorities raided the loft on Thursday night and arrested Mr. Posner, his wife, Betty, and 19 others on charges that included money laundering and promoting prostitution. No clients were arrested.

According to the police, Mr. Posner, a 52-year-old tax lawyer, funneled the club’s money to an account for Voter March, the grass-roots demonstration organization he started shortly after the 2000 election that has been largely inactive since 2004. He deposited money into several other accounts, the police said, adding that the amounts were low enough to avoid raising a red flag at the Internal Revenue Service.

Investigators seized $570,000 from 13 bank accounts and two safety deposit boxes held by the Posners, all of which could be traced back to the dance club, a spokeswoman for the Manhattan district attorney’s office said.

The defendants, who include dancers and other club employees, were scheduled to be arraigned on Friday night in Manhattan Criminal Court. If convicted on the top charge of money laundering, Mr. Posner could face up to 15 years in state prison.

No one answered a telephone call to Mr. Posner’s law office in Manhattan. Mr. Posner’s lawyer, Steven D. Ateshoglou, declined to comment through his secretary.

Edward W. Hayes, a Manhattan lawyer, said he was representing several of the people who were arrested, though he declined to specify whom.

“There’s a lot of girls that work there, and very few of them do anything that you shouldn’t do,” Mr. Hayes said. “Most of the people that work there are just young people that need to work nights and pick up a couple of bucks. There’s no organized crime element here.”

Mr. Hayes said the clients were “very, very wealthy people,” but he did not know whether any of them were prominent.

On its Web site, the Hot Lap Dance Club, also known as Premium Events, bills itself as the city’s premier private lap dance club, with nightly erotic shows featuring lesbian dancers and sex toys.

“And given its private, more intimate setup, Hot Lap Dance is also one of the finest spots to let it all hang out at your bachelor party,” the site said.

The site included several nude photos. Four dancers were arrested, according to the criminal complaint filed in court on Friday, one of whom, Cassandra Malandri, performed in pornographic films under the name Alexia Moore.

The club is at 344 West 38th Street, between Eighth and Ninth Avenues, in a building that includes both commercial and residential spaces. To get to the club, one must walk through an industrial hallway, take a freight elevator to the fifth floor and ring a buzzer on a door that says “Members.” A membership card and $50 are required for admission, according to the police. The cards were obtained through e-mail and by word of mouth, the police said.

The club had a bring-your-own-alcohol policy, but undercover detectives were able to secure alcohol by tipping employees, police said.

The police learned of the club in July 2007 as part of a narcotics investigation, according to Sgt. Christopher Koch, a supervisor with the Police Department’s Vice/Club Team.

A detective came across an advertisement on Craigslist for a lap dance club and, after responding to it, he received a link to the club’s Web site, according to the criminal complaint.

During an undercover detective’s visit to the club last August, a dancer told him that there was a “house dealer of cocaine,” who “made rounds at midnight,” the complaint said. One of the employees introduced the detective to a man who went by the name Lou, who told him he “was the boss,” according to the complaint. Some of the women called him “Daddy,” the complaint said.

On one occasion, Lou told the detective he had a source on the Police Department’s payroll and would be able to detect an officer, the complaint said.

When a detective visited the club in June, Ms. Malandri offered to meet with him at a different location with another dancer to have a threesome for $5,000, the complaint said.

The business earned $1 million over 10 months, the police said.

On Friday afternoon, the club had a notice on the door saying it was closed.

Ramdat Harihar, the owner of R & C Apparel Corporation, on the second floor of the building, said he had been there for 15 years and had never encountered any trouble with the dancers or the clients.

“I always see beautiful ladies coming in and well-dressed guys,” he said. “But I didn’t know what it was. I heard it was for a photography studio.”