| Georgia (USA): Sex tourism thriving in Bible Belt |
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| 01:13am 06/04/2006 |
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music: Peter Gabriel - Red Rain
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Sex tourism thriving in Bible Belt
Tue Apr 4, 2006 10:01 AM ET
By Verna Gates and Mickey Goodman
> ATLANTA (Reuters) - In a sleazy hotel room,
> "Brittany," then aged 16 and drugged into oblivion,
> waited for the men to arrive. Her pimps sent as many
> as 17 clients an evening through the door.
>
> A "john" could even pre-book the pretty young
> blonde for $1,000 a night, sometimes flying in and
> then flying out from a nearby airport.
>
> None of this happened in Bangkok or Costa
> Rica, places that have become synonymous with sex
> tourism and underage sex.
>
> It took place in Atlanta, the buckle of the
> U.S. Bible Belt, where the world's busiest passenger
> airport provides a cheaper, more convenient and
> safer underage sex destination for men seeking girls
> as young as 10.
>
> "Men fly in, are met by pimps, have sex with a
> 14-year-old for lunch, and get home in time for
> dinner with the family," said Sanford Jones, the
> chief juvenile judge of Fulton County, Georgia.
>
> A new federal law passed in 2003 ensures that
> American sex tourists landing on foreign soil and
> hiring prostitutes under the age of 18 can get 30
> years in prison.
>
> But in Georgia, punishment for pimping or
> soliciting sex with a girl under 18 is only five to
> 20 years, according to Deborah Espy, the Deputy
> District Attorney of Fulton County.
>
> "Men are coming to Atlanta to have sex with a
> child," said LaKendra Baker, project manager for the
> Center to End Adolescent Sexual Exploitation
> (CEASE).
>
> Half of the street-level prostitutes in
> Atlanta are believed to be under 18, according to
> experts.
>
> Others are booked through Internet sex sites
> and from social sites like Black Planet, where girls
> innocently post profiles, said Baker.
>
> Just in March, police arrested a Canadian man
> meeting a 14-year-old girl he found through the
> Internet, said Cathey Steinberg, executive director
> of the Juvenile Justice Fund, which funds treatment
> for abused girls and prevention.
>
> Another man drove from North Georgia, with a
> bag containing a teddy bear, a love note and
> condoms, snorting methamphetamine on the way.
>
> He expected a 13-year-old girl, but instead
> found Heather Lackey, a corporal with the Peachtree
> City Police Department.
>
> "People are stunned that Atlanta's the No. 1
> sex center in the country," said Steinberg.
>
> The FBI has identified 14 U.S. cities as
> centers for the sexual exploitation of children. In
> addition to Atlanta, they are Chicago, Dallas,
> Detroit, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Miami, Minneapolis,
> New York, San Diego, San Francisco, St. Louis,
> Tampa, and Washington, D.C.
>
> RUNAWAYS AT MOST RISK
>
> In all, an estimated 200,000 to 300,000
> underage girls are prostituted in the United States,
> according to a University of Pennsylvania study.
>
> Most youths caught up in the sex trade are
> runaways, like Brittany, whose 19-year-old
> "rescuers" soon demanded a return on their
> investment.
>
> "I didn't have any place to go. My mom hated
> me for what I was doing to the family," said
> Brittany, who did not want to be identified by her
> real name.
>
> Up to 90 percent of runaways are believed to
> end up as prostitutes, with a third lured into
> prostitution within 48 hours. Some are sold into
> sexual slavery by their parents, according to a 2005
> study by the Atlanta Women's Agenda.
>
> Some get seduced by recruiters. Pimps use
> handsome young men and sometimes girls as fronts.
>
> "A 16-year-old controlling a group of girls
> will not face the same penalties an adult would
> receive," said Patricia Crone, director of the
> Office of Juvenile Justice Demonstration Project.
>
> Once snagged, the grooming process begins.
> Typically, the pimp's friends sleep with her, then
> come threats, beatings and gang rapes. Caresses and
> gifts, including drugs and alcohol, follow abuse,
> the Atlanta Women's Agenda study found.
>
> Brittany said she was showered with fancy
> dinners, clothes and methamphetamine. But she also
> describes horror. "It made me feel dirty. It was
> demeaning," said Brittany.
>
> The sex slaves are trafficked in and out of
> cities to supply sporting events, conventions or rap
> concerts.
>
> During the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, one man
> kept boys and hosted sex parties nightly, said Baker
> of the group CEASE.
>
> The pimps even held an annual "Player's Ball"
> in Atlanta in 2003, openly buying and selling women
> and naming a "Player of the Year," according to the
> Atlanta Women's Agenda study.
>
> The risks are worth it. While there are few
> reliable statistics, child sexual exploitation is
> believed to be the world's third-biggest money maker
> for organized crime, said Stephanie Davis, policy
> adviser to Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin.
>
> One reason for the demand is the false
> assumption that youths are disease-free.
>
> On the contrary, with tissues not fully
> developed, they are more prone to lacerations. HIV
> infections among females aged 16 to 21 are 50
> percent higher than for men, a 1998 study in the
> Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes
> reported.
>
> Atlanta has won two new federal grants to
> establish units to fight the trafficking of underage
> sex slaves and to hire more undercover detectives,
> said Carole Morgan, director of the North Central
> Georgia Law Enforcement Academy.
>
> But the experts fear that may not be enough.
>
> "It won't stop until people say, 'My city
> isn't safe for kids anymore,'" said Crone.
>
> "This is a place where you can buy, sell or
> rent kids. It must be stopped." |
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| Michigan: Pimp gets 25 years for kidnap, sex crimes |
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| 01:25am 06/04/2006 |
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Pimp gets 25 years for kidnap, sex crimes
Ex-Toledoan forced teen into prostitution
By ROBIN ERB
BLADE STAFF WRITER
Toledo Blade
DETROIT - The voice of an Adrian teenager - who four years ago was raped, held captive, and forced to prostitute herself - filled a still federal courtroom in Detroit yesterday shortly before the man convicted as her captor and pimp was sentenced to a quarter-century behind bars.
"It ... makes me sick how you treated me. ... How can you sleep at night?" asked the 18-year-old woman, whom The Blade is identifying as "Marie."
Only once did her voice waver, as she spoke of the "shame and embarrassment" after finding out she contracted hepatitis C, a disease that can be transmitted sexually, and her fear of one day passing the disease to her children.
She said she continues to have hearing problems from the time Clarence Brown, now 33, battered her.
Sitting at a nearby table with his attorney, Brown didn't move.
Following a five-day trial last year, Brown was convicted of kidnapping the teenager and forcing her to prostitute herself for several days at an Indiana truck stop in 2001.
Holly Hollis, a 22-year-old hooker at the time of the ordeal, pleaded guilty to sex trafficking in children and is serving a nearly four-year sentence for her part in "training" the teenager.
U.S. District Court Judge Arthur Tarnow offered Brown the chance to speak, and Brown briefly complained that he had an inadequate attorney.
"Is there anything else you'd like to tell me?" Judge Tarnow asked.
"Just that I'm innocent of these charges," Brown responded.
Judge Tarnow sentenced the former Toledoan to 25 years in prison for three convictions, including sex trafficking of children.
"This is one of the heaviest sentences I've ever imposed, certainly the heaviest where there hasn't been a killing," said Judge Tarnow, who has been a federal judge for nearly seven years. "To a certain extent, this is just as serious. The victim will never be able to enjoy her life the way she would have."
The girl left her home in Adrian, where she lived with her grandmother, in November, 2001, to celebrate her upcoming 14th birthday with a 19-year-old boyfriend - a man her grandmother did not know about.
Marie lied, telling her grandmother she was going out with a friend. But over the next few days, while her grandmother filed a police report and searched for her, Marie and the man traveled to several houses around the Toledo and Ypsilanti areas. He assured the increasingly nervous Marie that she would be taken home soon.
They met Brown and Holly Hollis, and eventually, Marie and her boyfriend fought. He abandoned her with Brown and Hollis, who refused to take her home and informed the teenager she was in "whore training."
Brown brutalized both women, raped Marie, and forced her to work at a truck stop near Fort Wayne, Ind. Ten days after she left home, she was alone with a trucker, who helped the teenager escape.
Norm Robiner, Brown's attorney, reminded the judge yesterday that the girl, once away from his client, didn't immediately call 911, but rode through several states with the trucker before calling home.
But Judge Tarnow admonished that the crime was not a momentary lapse of judgment.
"This wasn't just go in and rob and bank or go in and do this bad thing or this bad thing. This went on for a period of time," he said.
Judge Tarnow also advised Brown about the rights to an appeal. But the judge warned Brown that, even though the guilty verdict came from a jury, "I would have come to the same conclusion."
Contact Robin Erb at:
robinerb@theblade.com
or 419-724-6133. |
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| Florida: Homeland official arrested in online sex sting |
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| 01:30am 06/04/2006 |
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MSNBC.com
Homeland official arrested in online sex sting
Agency's deputy press secretary held for soliciting for a child on Internet
BREAKING NEWS
The Associated Press
Updated: 11:06 p.m. ET April 4, 2006
MIAMI - The deputy press secretary for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security was arrested Tuesday for using the Internet to seduce what he thought was a teenage girl, authorities said.
Brian J. Doyle, 55, was arrested at his residence in Maryland on charges of use of a computer to seduce a child and transmission of harmful material to a minor. The charges were issued out of Polk County, Fla.
Doyle, of Silver Spring, Md., had a sexually explicit conversation with what he believed was a 14-year-old girl whose profile he saw on the Internet on March 14, the Polk County Sheriff's Office said in a statement.
The girl was an undercover Polk County Sheriff's Computer Crimes detective, the sheriff's office said.
Doyle sent the girl pornographic movie clips and had sexually explicit conversations via the Internet, the statement said.
Used government cell phone
During other online conversations, Doyle revealed his name, that he worked for the Homeland Security Department and offered his office and government issued cell phone numbers, the sheriff's office said.
Doyle also sent photos of himself to the girl, but authorities said they were not sexually explicit.
On several occasions, Doyle instructed her to perform a sexual act while thinking of him and described explicit activities he wanted to have with her, investigators said.
Doyle later had a telephone conversation with an undercover deputy posing as the teenager and encouraged her to purchase a web camera to send graphic images of herself to him, the sheriff's office said.
He was booked into Maryland's Montgomery County jail where he was waiting to be extradited to Florida, the sheriff's office said.
There was no immediate response to messages left on Doyle's government-issued cell phone and his e-mail, and he could not be reached by phone at the jail for comment.
Agency `will cooperate fully'
Homeland Security press secretary Russ Knocke in Washington said he could not comment on the details of the investigation. "We take these allegations very seriously, and we will cooperate fully with the ongoing investigation," Knocke said.
Doyle, who is the fourth-ranking official in the department's public affairs office, was expected to be placed on administrative leave Wednesday morning.
"We will go after child predators, no matter where they live, to protect our innocent children," said Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd, in a statement from his office.
"This investigation shows that the long arm of the law can reach anyone, anywhere, anytime, who tries to harm our youth," Judd said. "There is no question that Doyle believed that he was having these disgusting, obscene discussions, online and on the phone, with a young girl. His conduct is vile and inexcusable."
This breaking story will be updated.
© 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
© 2006 MSNBC.com
URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12159118/from/ET/ |
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| North Carolina: Forum targets 'crisis of silence' |
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| 11:26am 06/04/2006 |
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http://www.newsobserver.com/102/story/425429.html
Forum targets 'crisis of silence'
Cheryl Johnston Sadgrove, Staff Writer
When psychiatrist Linnea Smith and others began organizing a conference on sex trafficking two years ago, they decided to put the words "Breaking the Crisis of Silence" in the title because few people realized such human exploitation was happening in North Carolina.
"There's denial or victim blaming and denial," Smith said. "This is something that happens in third-world developing impoverished countries, but it doesn't happen in Raleigh."
But the two years of conference planning and arrests involving alleged sex trafficking have already increased attention to the subject, she said.
In October, three Raleigh residents faced federal charges after law enforcement officials said they brought women from New York, New Jersey and Maryland into the state, and recruited North Carolinians as young as 14, to work at three brothels.
What has come out of the collaboration with UNC-Chapel Hill, the Carolina Women's Center and other agencies is a two-day international conference starting Friday at the Radisson Hotel in Research Triangle Park.
The conference will focus on international efforts to stop human trafficking, federal services provided to trafficking victims, the demand for sex tourism and other sexual exploitation, and identifying trafficking victims.
Statistics vary on how many people are brought by threat or force into the United States every year and exploited for labor or sex.
The U.S. Department of State's Trafficking in Persons Report for 2005 estimates that 14,500 to 17,500 are brought in annually. An estimated 80 percent of trafficking victims are women and children, mostly brought for sexual exploitation.
Part of the conference will explore how North Carolina could help law enforcement agencies recognize sex trafficking situations and help victims receive services instead of being deported.
Sen. Ellie Kinnaird, who plans to attend, is interested in model legislation two UNC School of Law students are putting together as part of a Human Rights and Policy Clinic in their last year.
"If there's a state law, it's more likely that state and local officials will be familiar with the topic," said Hannah Little, one of the law students.
The state also could fill in the gap for victims who don't meet the strict federal standard to be considered a victim of trafficking, she added. The federal government enacted a Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act in 2000. It gives victims the opportunity to receive visas to stay in the country and receive aid.
"In particular, we're looking at how to make sure victims are provided services, and how to make sure that they have the best possible chance of being properly assessed for the trafficking visa that they may be eligible for," said Deborah Weissman, professor of law and director of clinical programs.
"We're actually right now trying to put together what would be a model team to see if we can put together one case," she said.
IF YOU GO
The conference will take place 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. Friday and 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday. The fee, which includes meals, is $60 for non-students and $25 for college students. Scholarships are available for students.
More information can be found at http://womenscenter.unc.edu/trafficking/ or by calling 962-2643 or (800) 845-8640.
Staff writer Cheryl Johnston Sadgrove can be reached at 932-2005 or cheryl.sadgrove@newsobserver.com. |
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