413047-Underground-Commercial-Sex-Economy

seven sites were finalized in June 2011, we were contacted by stakeholders in the governor’s office of an
eighth city that had recently formed a human trafficking task force. This city was interested in
participating in any ongoing, national human trafficking research. After several conversations with
members of the newly formed task force, we agreed it would be in our best interest to add this eighth site,
especially given that this city is known as an origin, transit, and destination city for human trafficking.
Therefore, the final eight MSAs included 19 : Washington, DC; Dallas, Texas; Kansas City, Missouri; San
Diego, California; Seattle, Washington; Denver, Colorado; Miami, Florida; and Atlanta, Georgia.
Although all eight sites reported significant underground commercial sex economies, their economies
differed in a number of important respects: 20
Six sites observed gang involvement, while only three of those six said UCSE activity is dominated
by gangs.
Three sites reported significant hierarchical structures in their UCSE that were indicative of
organized crime.
Five sites reported that offenders are frequently in communication with one another.
Three sites reported that sophisticated money laundering takes place.
Four sites reported that many sex traffickers are former drug traffickers.
Four sites (not the same as above) reported that sex traffickers are concurrently dealing drugs.
Three sites have significant Asian involvement in trafficking.
Two sites have significant Eastern European involvement.
Five sites have significant Latino involvement.
In each of these important dimensions, our sample is diverse and ultimately yields important site-to-site
variations.
After site selection, we identified the primary law enforcement agencies in each city, and in some cases in
the surrounding metropolitan area, that investigated human trafficking, child pornography, and
prostitution cases. Our initial target group was local law enforcement, 21 instead of federal law
enforcement or prosecutors, since they would be the most knowledgeable about how the local UCSE
operates today and how it is has changed over time. Federal law enforcement officials tend to be more
experienced with how the UCSE operates at the interstate level, and moreover, typically only stay with a
local bureau for a specified amount of time. Thus, they would not have the historical or in-depth
knowledge that local law enforcement would possess. Likewise, federal prosecutors only prosecute a
fraction of the cases that are brought to them by the police and are not in the field every day; therefore, it
did not make sense to focus on federal prosecutors as our main stakeholder unit of analysis.
The chief law enforcement officer at each primary law enforcement agency was sent a letter requesting
their agency’s formal participation in the study (see appendix D for the participation letter). The chief law
enforcement officer for each primary agency had to agree, in writing, to the terms of the study protocol
outlined in the letter, and designate a staff member responsible for assisting with the coordination of our
data collection. This occurred in each of the eight sites selected.
Stakeholder Interview Process
We conducted stakeholder interviews with a number of relevant parties. We began our data collection
process with law enforcement because of their on-the-ground experience with the underground
commercial sex market. They understand all the different facets of the underground commercial sex
market, particularly how they operate, the individuals within them, and how they have changed over time.
19 Law enforcement agencies in all eight sites were informed that the location of the cities would not be confidential and would be
disclosed in the final report.
20 One city is not included in the following breakdown since it was not part of the initial screening process.
21 This included police, sheriff, and state-level investigation agencies, depending on the structure of the law enforcement
departments in the selected sites.
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