LAS VEGAS – Former “Hollywood Madam” Heidi Fleiss said she’ll go it alone to open a southern Nevada brothel with male prostitutes catering to female customers.

Less than a week after saying she was moving from California to a remote desert crossroads to partner with an established brothel owner, Fleiss, 39, said the relationship had soured but she still planned what she called “Heidi’s Stud Farm.”

“I’m doing it on my own,” Fleiss told the Las Vegas Review-Journal for a Tuesday report. “I’m not looking for a pimp.”

Brothel owner Joe Richards, who had notified the Nye County Commission that he planned to employ Fleiss as madam and hostess at his Cherry Patch Ranch in remote Crystal, notified the commission on Friday that he changed his mind.

Nye County officials in Pahrump have said Fleiss, a convicted felon, might not get a license to operate a brothel. She had not submitted an application as of Tuesday.

“There are no guarantees that this is going to happen for her,” Nye County Commissioner Joni Eastley told the Review-Journal.

Nye County, northwest of Las Vegas, prohibits felons convicted of offenses involving “moral turpitude” from working at brothels. However, the law would let the county Liquor and License Board – made up of the five county commissioners and the sheriff – grant a brothel owners’ license to a convicted felon.

“I need to see something tangible before I believe it,” Sheriff Tony DeMeo said.

Fleiss ran a high-priced Hollywood prostitution ring for actors and wealthy clients before she was convicted in 1995 of money laundering, tax evasion and attempted pandering. She was released in 1999 after 21 months in a California prison.

Nye County is one of 10 rural Nevada counties where prostitution is legal under county and state oversight. Prostitution is illegal in Nevada’s most populous areas, including Las Vegas and surrounding Clark County, and Reno and surrounding Washoe County.