by Lorine Parks
“Dear Grandpa” – doesn’t mean what it used to. It’s now a come-on for illicit sex.
What is the difference – between smuggling and sex trafficking? Smuggling denotes the transportation of illegal goods or humans; sex trafficking is the exploitation of humans, usually under-age young girls, for purposes of prostitution.
Detective Kenny Turner of the Long Beach Police Department and former Marine, gave us a picture of the sex trafficking that is going on in every community in America, right now. For a fact, young prostitutes walk Artesia Boulevard at Lakewood in Bellflower right now, in front of their motels.
How young? DOB-Date of Birth on police records in Salt Lake City show the girls’ average age to be about 12 years old; some older and some as young as 9. FBI records in Long Beach back that up. What makes them available? Traits the victims have in common include bad home situations where there is sexual and emotional abuse; and extremely dysfunctional families. They may have lived in foster or group homes and run away because they are already involved in petty crime: truancy, shop-lifting, promiscuous sex, alcohol or marijuana.
They may call themselves “runaway” but they are looked down upon by their pimps who use them as “throwaway” lives.
What is the between human trafficking and kidnapping?
Human trafficking is defined in the penal code, said Kenny, as depriving or violating personal liberty, as versus kidnapping, where one is forcibly detained. In human sex trafficking, young girls are held by fear, fraud, deceit, coercion, violence, menace, threats to themselves – or – most insidiously – threats to another person. That could be a relative back home, a friend or protégé, or an infant.
True or false: Teen-age prostitutes work willingly, for the pleasure of it, get paid for their work and can walk away at any time if they want to leave. False!!! - these girls are victims of the Stockholm syndrome, which means they feel an emotional bond with their enslavers. It is a myth that they are happy, and a misconception that they can easily break away. They are in a downward spiral of doom.
Who is this? “A young man usually in his 30’s or 40"s, lives at home with his mother or grandmother, no apparent means of employment; no girlfriend.” That happens to be the profile of a pimp. Pimps take money directly from prostitutes, and turn part of it over to their bosses, who are known as “dons,” borrowing the term from the Mafia.
Once involved with a pimp, girls go through an emotional roller-coaster. First they are lured by the romance of male attention. They get their pimp’s unique tattoo branded on them; they may wear an article of his clothing, like “the boyfriend shirt.” But the “honeymoon stage” is short and then abuse occurs; the girls experience shame, depression and low self-esteem; then after threats and usually violence, the “making-up” period occurs just long enough for the cycle to begin again.
Typically a girl will leave her pimp 6-9 times, always returning. Ironically the victims don’t want to ask for help or go to the police, for fear of “getting into trouble.” As if they weren’t in trouble already.
There is the glimmer of a bright side – courts have come to see the prostitutes as victims, and special STAR courtroom are set aside for juveniles to be tried. Once convicted, they are set on a path for rehabilitation. STAR Court stands for Succeeding Through Achievement and Resilience.
Briefly, Court and Probation have partnered to provide referrals to specialized services for underage victims of sex trafficking. The genesis of the program was the noticeable increase in prostitution cases being filed in the delinquency courts, some carrying over to the dependency courts, because of sexual trafficking taking place among minors who were on the streets of LA County. Development of the Succeed Through Achievement and Resilience (STAR) Court was aimed at providing intervention and assistance to youth caught up in the perils of human sex trafficking.
The outcome of the program was the creation and continued success of the STAR Court that provides often life-saving services and intervention for minors who might otherwise be lost to the streets forever. The unexpected benefits are the collaborative participation and efforts of a multidisciplinary team of players who are invested and passionate about providing intervention services for youth. More about this in later Hubbubs.
HUMAN TRAFFFICKING IS THE FASTEST GROWING CRIME: Child prostitution has become big business. “Rights” to a girl may be “sold” from one pimp to another for $200 to $600 dollars, and the girls may be required to “turn” as many as 8 “tricks” a night.
Compare that to selling crack cocaine in the 1990’s. Once the white stuff, a “perishable commodity” is gone, there’s only the one-time profit. Plus it is very high risk. On the other hand, prostitutes are a self-sustaining commodity, to put it in economic terms: they can be used over and over.
Gangs have gotten into prostitution in big ways, said Detective Kenny. Asian gangs operate in massage parlors and nail salons. Afro-American gangs work the streets and motels and hotels. Mexican-American, Hispanic and Anglo, operate brothels and use vacant homes.
Chief culprits in facilitating the growth of sex trafficking? The computer and the iPhone. Fortunately, where interstate commerce is involved, the FBI can follow.
“Sexy escorts;” hot lines, YouTube, all ways to advertise. “Dear Grandpa” is not a term of endearment: it’s a come-on code phrase advertising very young girls for older men. Other terms like outlaw and hustler mean pimp; and a “stake” is the quota for the night.
Detective Kenny did not offer solutions. Rather, he showed us how this malevolence can happen, and how to see it all around us.
What can we as Rotarians do about it?