So Young: Can Underage Prostitution Be Stopped?

Just across the Estuary, the Oakland Police Department is trying to stem a rising tide of underage prostitution. This is the fifth and final installment in our series on the problem. You can read Part 1 , Part 2 here, Part 3 here and Part 4 here.

California Against Slavery (CAS) is a Fremont-based organization that aims to stem human trafficking for sex and labor, especially among minors as young as 12 years old. The organization will hold a “Move to Stop Modern Day Slavery” walkathon at San Leandro’s Marina Park on Aug. 28 to raise money and awareness about the growing problem. Read more about CAS and its fundraiser here.

Bay City News — Despite increased and nationally recognized efforts by the Oakland Police Department and the Alameda County District Attorney's office, the general consensus appears to be that domestic sex trafficking of minors is outpacing suppression and prevention efforts, with opinions about progress ranging from "just scratching the surface" to outright "losing the battle."

"It's growing faster than we can keep up with," said Officer Mark Rhoden of the police department's vice and child exploitation unit. "It's exponential in opposite directions because as it grows, we lose manpower."

Oakland's budget crisis has led to deep cuts in the Police Department; 80 officers were laid off last year, although 24 were recently rehired. 

The vice and child exploitation unit is down from five members to four — two of whom are grant-funded — and the unit's overtime budget is strained, said Sgt. Holly Joshi, a spokeswoman for the Oakland Police Department who spent three years with the vice and child exploitation unit.

She said the vice unit is unique in that its members do both police and investigative work.

"Normally the street team hands a case off to investigators to follow through," Joshi said. "Vice has to do day and night work."

The team sees each case from beginning to end, developing targets, going undercover, working with the district attorney's office, appearing in court and corroborating witness testimony, Joshi said.

More Money Would Help

She said the unit needs a bigger overtime budget and more equipment, such as undercover cars and an alternate facility.

"The undercover cars are used over and over again," Joshi said. "You can get burned."

The unit also doesn't do as many pimp stings as it used to because the overall department cuts have made it difficult to find the necessary funds and personnel, she said.

Police Chief Anthony Batts acknowledged the city is struggling to get ahead of its prostitution problem and said the Police Department needs a unit dedicated to vice and narcotics.

He said about 60 percent of the city's vice crimes are now tied to drug dealing or gang violence, so integrating the two law enforcement arms is becoming imperative.

"The ultimate impact will be having that dedicated unit," he said.

Having enough staff to aggressively fight sexual exploitation of children is especially important for two reasons, according to FBI Special Agent Marty Parker, who has worked on domestic trafficking in Oakland for 10 years.

First, more and more men are turning to pimping as a low-risk, lucrative alternative to drug and arms dealing. Second, by the nature of prostitution, it's easy for law enforcement to access the girls but difficult to get to the men who are exploiting them.

The pimps set up physical and psychological barriers to protect themselves from police, who now also have the Internet to contend with.

"We do have some ways to get around that, both high-tech and the less sophisticated means," Parker said, although she declined to elaborate on law enforcement's methods for reaching past the girls and getting to their abusers.

"But we always feel like we're one step behind," she added. "Prostitution growth is outpacing law enforcement progress."

Human trafficking is now tied with arms dealing as the world's second-largest criminal enterprise, just behind drug dealing, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. It's also the fastest-growing illegal industry in the world. 

The Economics of Pimping

A pimp with five or six girls working seven nights per week, $80 to $200 per trick, can make $600,000 annually, Joshi said.

Overhead costs are also much lower compared to drug dealing because there's no product to buy or package. Pimps can both use and sell their product over and over again, and exploited children have minimal needs.

Three fast food meals a day, a hair and nail appointment from time to time, and a motel room — which a john will often purchase in exchange for the girl's first trick of the night — are all it takes to keep the girls in business, Joshi said.

Pimping is also much lower risk than dealing drugs, which requires being out in the open and in danger of police or rival dealers, she said. A pimp can keep an eye on his girls from a safe distance.

"If you're a pimp, what do you do?" Joshi said. "Nothing. Absolutely nothing except sell false dreams to girls who stand out there all day. You say you offer protection, but even if you have a gun, you're not there. How are you offering protection?"

Joshi and others agree that pimps flock to Oakland because of its reputation as a mecca of street culture and its endless victim base.

Pimping is glamorized in music, movies and TV — the song "It's hard out here for a pimp" from Hustle and Flow even won an Academy Award in 2006 — and Oakland in particular has come to be associated with the sex trade, Joshi said.

The city is also rife with at-risk girls, many from single-parent homes. Some have come to Alameda County from other parts of the Bay Area.

According to Parker, the more the community learns to recognize these girls and appreciate the circumstances that brought them to this point, the sooner Alameda County can start to get a handle on the problem.

"A culture shift would certainly be a huge step," she said. "People need to see this is a big issue and see these girls aren't just out there because they want to be."

This the fifth and final installment in a series on underage prostitution in Oakland that is appearing on Alameda Patch this week. Read the first article here, the second one here, the third one here and the fourth one here. 

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