Update on 52 Kids Rescued From Prostitution

Yesterday the FBI announced it had rescued 52 children over the weekend from child sex trafficking throughout the US.

Today we have more information. The youngest child was 10 years old--sold into prostitution by her mother. Her customers were migrant workers.

The investigations typically target places where minors are likely to be sold for sex, including truck stops, casinos, public streets, and Internet websites.

According to KTLA-TV in Los Angeles, these are the cities and numbers of children rescued:

 Atlanta - 2

Chicago - 4

Cleveland (Toledo) - 7

Dallas - 2

Houston - 3

Las Vegas - 4

Los Angeles ( Riverside) - 2

Miami - 1

New York City - 5

Portland - 4

Sacramento - 4

San Diego - 3

Seattle - 9

Tampa - 2 

Remember, there are still more than 100,000 children enslaved in the US. Let us work and pray for them to be rescued, too--and for millions more never to enter this nightmare world.

Comments

[Charles]

I've slogged through the report you link to and many of its links and still cannot authenticate from it the idea that "The FBI" uses this number. Perhaps I've missed it. Can you succinctly and directly point to where I can find this? I can extrapolate from numbers presented in the charts for various cities out to the general population of the U.S. and come up with a number in the range you use; but I am not willing to do this myself.

[Diana Scimone]

Yes, 100,000. This is the figure used by the FBI, the US Department of Justice, and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (which estimates the number may be as high as 300,000).

Although these are good estimates based on many criteria, you are correct that there is no accurate number. Here's why, according to Shared Hope International's 2009 National Report on Domestic Minor Sex Trafficking--America's Prostituted Children:

"There is no national reporting measure currently in place to provide accurate reporting of the numbers of commercially sexually exploited youth in America. The proliferation of labels and variations in data reporting in each state creates an inability to assess the true scope of domestic minor sex trafficking.

"Nonetheless, experts have estimated numbers from 100,000 to 300,000 children each year are victimized in prostitution in America. It is critical to establish standard reporting metrics through a federal authority in order to address this crime and victimization in a national approach.

"The 42 Human Trafficking Task Forces funded through the Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Assistance have required performance metrics which collect the statistics and information on human trafficking cases involving foreign victims.

"Barriers to reporting on domestic sex trafficking victims must be lifted and these numbers collected as well in order to obtain a complete picture of the scope of domestic minor sex trafficking in the United States. Additionally, child protection agencies in each state should establish a classification of commercial sexual exploitation of children in the reporting format" (page 81).

You can read the report here: http://www.sharedhope.org/dmst/documents/SHI%20National%20Report_without%20cover.pdf

100,000 may not be an exact figure, but it is a good estimate--and if anything it is sadly low.

[singlextianman]

100,00? I challenge you to open source the statistical methodology by which you arrive at this number - a number which you associate with "enslavement" -- This is too important a question for sloppy intellectual foundations.