NL- You have to wonder how many of the parents thought their kid was dead…..
700 arrests across country as FBI rescues children from sex trade
by Chris McGrel
The Guardian http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/oct/27/fbi-rescues-children-from-sextrade
Tuesday 27 October 2009
The FBI says it rescued 52 children, one just 10 years old, from prostitution rings during nationwide raids that led to nearly 700 arrests. There were arrests in 36 cities after a surveillance operation of children sold for sex on the internet, on streets, in casinos and at truck stops.
Among those detained were 60 pimps, who face lengthy prison sentences for child trafficking. About 1,600 officers were involved in the three day operation.
"It is repugnant that children in these times could be subjected to the great pain, suffering and indignity of being forced into sexual slavery for someone else’s profit," said the assistant attorney general, Lanny Breuer. "The scourge of child prostitution still exists on the streets of our cities."
Most of the children rescued during the operation – known as Cross Country IV – were teenage girls.
The investigation is part of the "innocence lost" national initiative launched six years ago to combat child sex trafficking.
The initiative has resulted in the conviction of 510 people for child sex related crimes, including pimping, and the rescue of nearly 900 children, according to the FBI. Some of those convicted were given multiple life sentences.
The FBI said: "Information gleaned from those arrested often uncovers organised efforts to prostitute women and children across many states."
Ernie Allen, who heads the National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children, which worked with the FBI on the operation, said: "Child trafficking for the purposes of prostitution is organised criminal activity using kids as commodities for sale or trade. This is 21st century slavery."
Child welfare groups estimate that around 2 million children a year run away from home in the US, and that many of them are lured into prostitution or pornography to survive.
The justice department says there is an "epidemic" of commercial sex activity among children living on the streets. It says more than half of street girls are engaged in prostitution, many of them beginning between 12 and 14 years old.
"Pimp-controlled commercial sexual exploitation of children is linked to escort and massage services, private dancing, drinking and photographic clubs, major sporting and recreational events, major cultural events, conventions, and tourist destinations," the department says.
"About one-fifth of these children become entangled in nationally organised crime networks and are trafficked nationally. They are transported around the United States by a variety of means – cars, buses, vans, trucks or planes – and are often provided counterfeit identification to use in the event of arrest."
Sergeant Nicole Donnelly of the Miami police said that several children freed in raids in the city would be taken into care. "We are hopefully recovering these juveniles and putting them in different types of programmes to get their life back on track where they should be," she said.
So they rescued 52 kids and arrested 60 pimps, not bad, but I take it the other 640 or so arrests were of adult prostitutes?
That’s over ten women going through the legal system, and potentially ending up with a criminal record, for every child rescued.
Bit of a weird situation isn’t it?
If a girl’s a day short of 18 then she’s a child victim to be rescued, but if they pick her up on her birthday she’s just another criminal whore.
I wonder how many more kids they could rescue if they didn’t waste resources busting adults on Craigslist?
You have to go after the adutls to get to the children. If it was a ratio of 100 to 1, or even 1000 to 1, rescuing children from forced protitution is worth the cost.
Ken, how do you find the children being forced into prostitution without going after the adults involved with them?
And dont you think its possible that it was some of the adult protitutes who were arrested that aided the investigation to rescue the children?
The only solution is to legalize prostitution. But I’d prefer to amend the age of legal prostitution to 21 years old. 18 is too young to be engaged in prostitution. Sorry to all you pervert, porno faggots, that can’t get off unless the girl looks like she’s twelve. Fuck you…kill yourselves.
You have to go after the adutls to get to the children.
Bullshit. Would you crack down on underaged drinking by criminalising and randomly arresting hundreds of adult drinkers?
If it was a ratio of 100 to 1, or even 1000 to 1, rescuing children from forced protitution is worth the cost.
Whatever the ratio, it’s not a trade-off that they need to make.
You realise that an 18 year old arrested as an adult prostitute probably used to be one of those underaged teens you’re so concerned about?
Plenty of those adults will be just as forced, and just as fucked up, as the kids that were rescued. Where do you draw the line between a victim in need of help and a criminal deserving punishment?
Why do their lives need to be fucked up further by being made criminals, just because they’re older? Giving a girl a criminal record for prostitution is a great way of trapping her into that lifestyle. Even if she gets out she’ll have that conviction following her around.
Totally counter-productive, and a really fucking stupid waste of tax payer’s money.
Ken, how do you find the children being forced into prostitution without going after the adults involved with them?
Going after the adults involved in child prostitution is a good thing. Wasting resources busting hundreds of adult hookers is just bullshit.
Ideally they should legalise and regulate it. You don’t get so many underage prostitutes in Nevada’s legal brothels, do you?
Anyway, this FBI propaganda piece makes it sound like the focus of the operation was on freeing kids. In reality that’s more of a side effect; most of their raids and stings purely target adults, with no expectation of finding anyone underage.
Looking at some of the local reports, this operation doesn’t seem that successful to me, not when it comes to stopping child prostitution. For example, in the whole Las Vegas operation – which involved a hell of a lot of LEOs – they found a total of 4 underage prostitutes, the youngest of them 14, and none of their pimps seem to have been caught. That compares with 75 adult prostitutes arrested in the same area. Maybe they’d have found more children, and rescued younger kids in more underground child prostitution, if they’d concentrated on that and hadn’t cast such a wide net?
All I’m saying that they should focus on the kids and violent pimps, not use expensive stings to arrest 40 year old Craigslist hookers, or turn 18 year old prostitutes into convicted criminals.
And dont you think its possible that it was some of the adult protitutes who were arrested that aided the investigation to rescue the children?
Sure it’s possible, but unlikely considering the speed of the 3 day operation and the way they’re run. It’s also possible that adult prostitutes would be more willing to come forward and aid investigations if they weren’t going to be arrested for it.