413047-Underground-Commercial-Sex-Economy

setting is to be the residential brothel, but when forced, they’ll turn mobile and they’ll
turn into what they call “a delivery service” where the women will be driven to different
guys’ houses. (DC Service Provider)
Women inside some Latino brothels have been found to be sex trafficked. Investigators have uncovered
cases where women are sold to recruiters in Latin American countries (particularly Mexico, the
Dominican Republic, and Guatemala) and then smuggled to the United States where they are forced to
work off their smuggling debts in brothels. Investigators also noted that the women are also moved along
the same pathways as drugs and weapons:
Respondent 1: The only thing that we are seeing … our training basically says that the
immigrants are being routed along the same trails that the drugs and guns are.
Respondent 2: There are buses, van services … And that is the same thing as them
getting paid. Some of the girls are not coming here willingly. They are being sold off in
their countries, shipped or driven here, and forced to work off the debt they earned for
coming to the United States. (DC Law Enforcement Officials)
There are other women that investigators believe are voluntarily working in prostitution in Latino
brothels. These women keep half of the money charged, but may also be charged fees for condoms or
other items. When asked whether the women in the brothels were able to keep any of their money, two
investigators responded:
Respondent 1: They get half and then they charge them for little things like if they need
some stuff, they charge them for that.
Respondent 2: They are starting to do that. If they needed more condoms they would
charge them. They would not charge them an exorbitant amount like a Korean brothel
would to make more money off of them but they would definitely charge them. … What
did one girl 49 say She was charged $10 for 50 condoms. …
Respondent 2: But the girls there, in the Latino brothels, this is something that they
know they can do and make money. They tend to turn to it. A lot of them come in here
voluntarily because they know what they have to do and everything, and then the guys are
paying them. I think they charge $30 for 15 minutes and they get half of the $30. (DC Law
Enforcement Officials)
Compared to the AMPs and street/Internet-based sex trafficking and prostitution in DC, officials noted
that Latino brothels appear to have more connection to gangs, drugs, and weapons. The connection to
drug and weapons trafficking is due to the involvement of gangs, such as MS-13. While gangs have been
found to be directly involved in perpetrating sex trafficking in brothels, they are also known to extort
brothel owners/operators in exchange for protection. One prosecutor described the connection between
MS-13 and sex trafficking in DC:
I think in the last couple of years certainly, you definitely heard more of guys that are
either connected to MS[-13] or loosely affiliated will be coming around to collect the
money and even if they’re not running the day-to-day operations of these places, they’re
definitely very heavily involved in collecting protection money and everything like that
from these places so there’s definitely a network now. The girls are moving from places in
Maryland, Virginia, and DC constantly moving. I think one: Because for law enforcement
purposes, two: You want to have new merchandise so that’s a huge challenge and will be a
huge challenge for you guys. Really focus on this because I think it’s a really big issue in
DC (DC Prosecutor)
Similarly, an investigator described how MS-13 extorts Latino brothels and how gangs recruit minors as
sexual servants for gang members in Northern Virginia:
49 Although law enforcement is using “girls” in these quotes, the research team clarified that they were referring to adult women and
not minors.
85