Commissioners Give Police Greater Latitude To Fight Trafficking, Prostitution - Alpharetta, GA Patch:
Showing posts with label Georgia. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Georgia. Show all posts
Saturday, March 4, 2017
Tuesday, November 8, 2016
The Business of Buying Our Children: Child sex trafficking north of the Atlanta perimeter
"“And that was the most shocking thing to some folks because they were like, ‘Wait. That’s our churchgoing folks. That’s our ball team people, you know, and what it comes down to is that’s where the disposable income is.”"
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The Business of Buying Our Children: Child sex trafficking north of the Atlanta perimeter:
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"“So many of these kids are being exploited by somebody that they know. A lot of the times, their parents are the one doing the exploiting,” Bexley said. “And often times, the ones who are buying are not the Boogeyman. They’re not all pedophiles either, which is really interesting. They are people who have disposable incomes, and they are looking to have sex and they don’t care who they’re having sex with.”"
The Business of Buying Our Children: Child sex trafficking north of the Atlanta perimeter:
Sunday, February 7, 2016
36 arrested in Human Trafficking Sting in North Georgia, East Tennessee |
""In the two day period we had over 400 persons contact our account asking questions about having sex and of those 9 knew they were talking to a child," Keenan said."
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36 arrested in Human Trafficking Sting in North Georgia, East Tennessee |
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36 arrested in Human Trafficking Sting in North Georgia, East Tennessee |
Tuesday, October 28, 2014
How to Spot a Sex Trafficking Victim at a Hotel | TIME
The hotel industry's battle against sex trafficking. Check out this article.
Thursday, September 19, 2013
Human trafficking notices debut in Augusta, across Georgia | The Augusta Chronicle
Source: The Augusta Chronicle
The issue of human trafficking is getting increased exposure in Augusta and across the state with a new law that went into effect this week.
Bars, airports and hospitals are posting notices in an effort to reduce the number of people in Georgia who are forced into commercial sexual exploitation and labor servitude.
MICHAEL HOLAHAN/STAFF
A sign at Georgia Regents Medical Center provides information on a hot line for human trafficking victims.
Thursday, September 6, 2012
Go-go dancer sentenced for prostituting teens | www.ajc.com
Go-go dancer sentenced for prostituting teens | www.ajc.com
Thursday, Sept. 6, 2012
By David Ibata
Thursday, Sept. 6, 2012
By David Ibata
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
A former Atlanta go-go dancer was sentenced Wednesday to 80 years in prison and the rest of his life on probation after his conviction in Douglas County for trafficking in victims as young as 15 years old for prostitution, authorities said.
Steven Donald Lemery was found guilty Aug. 24 of six counts of human trafficking, two counts of aggravated child molestation, and enticing a child for indecent purposes and pandering by compulsion.
Wednesday, Superior Court Judge David T. Emerson sentenced Lemery to what prosecutors described as a life sentence. The 37-year-old defendant will not be eligible for parole for 50 years, according to Assistant District Attorney Rachel Ackley.
Two of Lemery’s victims were 15 years old at the time of the offenses, and a third was 18, Ackley told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution in a phone interview. One of the 15-year-olds and the 18-year-old were brought across state lines by Lemery and forced into prostitution.
“There was testimony how victims were held in the house, not allowed to leave, given drugs and alcohol, and just subjected to all kinds of terrible sex acts,” Ackley said. “One of the victims testified at trial by being forced to prostitute and while being held at a client’s house, he was held down and burned as they attempted to rape them.”
In March, Lemery’s former roommate and co-defendant Christopher Lynch was sentenced to 30 years — 14 years to be served in prison — after he pleaded guilty to two counts of sexual exploitation of a child, pimping a victim under the age of 18 and pandering by compulsion.
Lemery danced under the name Steven Lang at B.J. Rooster’s on Cheshire Bridge Road. Lynch was a drag show personality better known to local audiences as Pasha Nicole. The suspects lived in a home off Chapel Hill Road in Douglasville.
Lemery was targeted by investigators in January 2011 after a victim from Alabama alerted authorities.
Lynch initially took credit in news interviews for aiding the investigation against Lemery, but was himself incriminated when a minor victim saw him on TV news and identified him to authorities.
Douglas Sheriff’s deputies identified victims in Georgia, Alabama and South Carolina in a trafficking scheme that allegedly had been going on for two to three years.
— Staff writer Christian Boone contributed to this article.
- Related articles
Monday, January 24, 2011
Feds: Atlanta emerging as a human trafficking hub
By KATE BRUMBACK
The Associated PressThursday, January 20, 2011; 3:03 PM
ATLANTA -- Federal authorities are highlighting Atlanta's emergence as a hub in human trafficking along the East Coast as they try to raise awareness about the problem and generate tips from the public.
Brock Nicholson of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement for Georgia and the Carolinas says human trafficking has been increasing in the Atlanta area and the crimes are often hard to uncover because many victims won't come forward.
Nicholson said victims often fear beatings from traffickers or arrest and deportation by authorities if they try to escape. He stressed that authorities will not punish or deport victims.
Nicholson said two troubling new trends are that victims are getting younger, some as young as 14, and traffickers are increasingly using violence to control victims.
Feds: Atlanta emerging as a human trafficking hub
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Friday, January 21, 2011
Nation & World | Feds: Atlanta emerging as a human trafficking hub | Seattle Times Newspaper
Federal authorities are highlighting Atlanta's emergence as a hub in human trafficking along the East Coast as they try to raise awareness about the problem and generate tips from the public.
Associated Press
ATLANTA —
Source: seattletimes.nwsource.comFederal authorities are highlighting Atlanta's emergence as a hub in human trafficking along the East Coast as they try to raise awareness about the problem and generate tips from the public.
Brock Nicholson of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement for Georgia and the Carolinas says human trafficking has been increasing in the Atlanta area and the crimes are often hard to uncover because many victims won't come forward.
Nicholson said victims often fear beatings from traffickers or arrest and deportation by authorities if they try to escape. He stressed that authorities will not punish or deport victims.
Nicholson said two troubling new trends are that victims are getting younger, some as young as 14, and traffickers are increasingly using violence to control victims.
Nation & World | Feds: Atlanta emerging as a human trafficking hub | Seattle Times Newspaper
Monday, August 9, 2010
When Children Cry.wmv | UNHCR: The UN Refugee Agency | Causes
Image by World Economic Forum via Flickr
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Angelina Jolie cares.. When Children Cry cares about all of our differently abled, damaged, broken, neglected & abused.When Children Cry.wmv | UNHCR: The UN Refugee Agency | Causes
Thursday, March 11, 2010
Prostituted Children: Victims or Criminals? | Georgia Public Broadcasting
Image via Wikipedia
By Rickey Bevington
media link
ATLANTA — The Senate Judiciary Committee Monday temporarily tabled a bill that addresses child prostitution. Each month in Georgia, experts estimate as many as 400 children are sold for sex. It happens on the street, through escort services, in hotels, and over the Internet. The U.S. Department of Justice lists Atlanta among 14 American cities where this is a problem. But is a child prostitute a victim, or a criminal? That's the question lawmakers are considering in SB 304.
Experts estimate as many as 400 children are sold for sex in Georgia each month. (photo courtesy Capitan Giona)
The trafficking of children for sex in Georgia is a crime most people do not see. Reverend Scott Weimer of North Avenue Presbyterian Church in midtown Atlanta say he was stricken with grief when one of his staff members witnessed what he believes was child prostitution. "A black sedan pulled up in front of the church, there was a young woman who was clearly underage who had been waiting on the corner," Weimer explains. After what be believes was an exchange money, the girl got into the car and drove off.
The intersection is one of hundreds in Atlanta listed on a report as a spot for child sex trafficking. Weimer founded a group called StreetGRACE. It works to rehabilitate victims of commercial sexual exploitation. But prostitution is a crime in Georgia. So, should police and judges treat a child prostitute as a criminal, or a victim?
Sen. Renee Unterman (R-Buford) says a prostituted child is a victim. "If a minister on Peachtree Street can go and talk about this, then I should have the courage to step onto the senate floor and talk about this also." Current law allows children – no matter how young -- to be charged with prostitution. Sen. Unterman wants child prostitutes to be classified as “unruly” under the juvenile code. Instead of going to jail, they would be treated as child abuse victims and eligible for social services such as counseling. Sen. Unterman says "it does no good to recognize you have a problem and say we’re not going to do anything about it. So now we have created a system of care, therapeutic services that can take care of young girls and young boys that are 12, 13, 14. I have actually seen a 10-year-old girl. Now tell me that’s not wrong."
Former Republican state senator Nancy Shaefer is leading a Christian-based opposition to Sen. Unterman’s proposal. Shaefer and other opponents agree child prostitutes are victims who need help, but Shaefer says "the Act of Prostitution cannot be ignored." She says children need to learn consequences. "In a speech I made fairly recently, I talked about a young girl that was head of a prostitution ring in the southeast I won’t say where in the southeast. And she was the madame! And she had all these young girls, 14 and younger, in her prostitution ring. Now there’s no way that we can turn our head and ignore that." Shaefer worries that “decriminalizing” child prostitution sends the message that it’s OK to prostitute oneself and it’s OK to break the law.
But Kaffie McCullough of the advocacy group A Future. Not A Past says the desire to punish is misguided. "Even if she’s out there by choice as some are saying, and the vast majority are not. Even if the small percentage she’s out there by choice, she’s a child, and that choice is an indication that something is way wrong for that child, says McCullough."
That’s why advocates like McCullough want more rehabilitation than punishment. And she argues that when it comes to sending a message, authorities should focus on building more cases against the people pimping the children, and the johns who are buying their sex. Not doing anything, advocates say, means the toll of victims from Georgia's commercial child sex trade would grow by 50 percent in two years.
Prostituted Children: Victims or Criminals? | Georgia Public Broadcasting
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Monday, March 1, 2010
Other Georgia cities say massage parlor regulations effective
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While Macon and Bibb County officials work to regulate the massage-parlor industry, other Georgia communities say similar measures have ended, reduced or prevented problems with prostitution and other crimes.
Murray Weed, the city attorney for Doraville, said that city has had problems with massage parlors in the past and is considering revisions to improve its ordinances to attack crime and health risks.
“There’s always been an element of trying to prevent organized crime and human slavery in your community, and government clearly has an interest in preventing that type of activity,” Weed said.
Bibb County commissioners plan to discuss their own proposal Tuesday. The latest draft of the proposal would require background checks for business owners and anyone giving massages. Parlors would have to close by 10 p.m., and anyone giving a massage would have to be a massage-school graduate.
Meanwhile, Macon Councilman Erick Erickson said he will introduce a proposal later this month that limits body contact to professionals who are licensed by the state.
‘We don’t have any’
At least 122 Georgia cities and counties regulate massage parlors, according to a tally by the Middle Georgia Alliance to End Regional Trafficking (ALERT). The group is pushing for local regulations and wrote the first draft of Bibb County’s proposed ordinance. The group’s chairman, Andrew Silver of Mercer University, said regulations can cut back on problems even if they can’t eliminate them.
That opinion is echoed in the experience of several governments that The Telegraph contacted.
Larry Harris, the licensing manager for Augusta and Richmond County, said background checks and other procedures have reduced the problems. He thinks other governments should enact a similar ordinance.
“If you don’t have anything in place, you’re kind of flying by the seat of your pants,” Harris said.
Harris said legitimate massage therapists in the Augusta area wanted the ordinance because it gave a bad name to their business. He speculates the adoption of the measure may have pushed prostitution or other problems out to other areas. Augusta’s regulations also tie in with state massage licensing procedures launched in 2006.
“We haven’t had any illicit activity since the inception of that state license,” Harris said.
Jim Elliott, city attorney for Warner Robins, said a code adopted there in 1978 appears to have been effective. He said he hasn’t heard of any problems with massage parlors there since the mid-1990s. The city requires background checks of owners and anyone performing massage, requires parlors to close by midnight and blocks massages away from the business.
“For the most part, knock on wood, we haven’t had many issues,” he said.
Albany has treated massage parlors as adult entertainment businesses, like strip clubs, since at least 1993. Code Enforcement Director Mike Tilson said he’s never heard of problems in his city from massage parlors.
“Those massage places on I-75 that are probably nefarious?” he said. “We don’t have any that I know of.”
Columbus and Muscogee County enforced massage-parlor business regulations from 1998 until the state passed its own regulations four years ago, said Yvonne Ivey, the occupation tax supervisor.
The city had a big problem with prostitution in the massage parlors before, but those went out of business after the city began requiring background checks and legitimate massage-school diplomas, she said. As a result, legitimate massage businesses made a rebound.
“It worked tremendously,” Ivey said.
Savannah’s massage parlor regulations, which require background checks and massage-school diplomas, have been in place since 1977.
Assistant City Manager Rochelle Small-Toney said she’s heard of no problems with illicit activity or legitimate massage therapists inconvenienced by the ordinance.
“Things seem to be working very well,” she said.
Bibb County officials have said there’s only one massage parlor in the unincorporated county that could be a problem. That’s Four Seasons Sauna on Arkwright Road, where two employees were arrested on prostitution charges in 2008. One of those employees, In Won Kang, pleaded guilty and was fined $1,000 and given a year’s probation. The other employee, Eun Hee Lee, skipped a court appearance last year on the prostitution charge. She’s wanted by police.
An employee of Four Seasons Sauna said last week there was no manager there who could talk to The Telegraph. But a sign on the door showed the Bibb County’s proposal, if adopted, could have at least some effect. Four Seasons Sauna is open Monday through Saturday from 9 a.m. to 2 a.m., and Sundays from 10:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. The county’s proposal says businesses would have to close by 10 p.m. and could not reopen before 8 a.m.
David Corr, a local leader of the Libertarian Party, told county commissioners earlier this month they have no business restricting the hours of a business. He described the proposal as the act of a “fascist Christian Taliban” and said there was no evidence of sex trafficking near Macon.
Silver acknowledges there have been no human trafficking charges filed near Macon. But he said the arrest of a 17-year-old on masturbation-for-hire charges is legal proof that modern-day sex slavery is here. A decade-old federal law says severe human trafficking includes “sex trafficking in which a commercial sex act is induced by fraud, force or coercion, or in which the person induced to perform such an act has not attained 18 years of age.”
In a talk to social workers earlier this month about human trafficking, Silver said Macon has become well-known.
“We have become the red-light district of Georgia,” he said.
Spreading regulations, crime
Silver worries that clamping down on illicit massage parlors here may simply drive the parlors elsewhere.
He said he’s trying to communicate with people in Forsyth, Valdosta, Cordele and other places, encouraging them to enact their own ordinances to head off the problem.
“Maybe if everyone smashes down at the same time, we’ll break the Whack-A-Mole machine,” he said.
Monroe County Commissioner Michael Bilderback said he hopes to pre-empt problems by getting an ordinance passed there. Previous crackdowns on various crimes in Bibb County pushed criminals to Monroe County, he said.
“It’s just kind of a cat-and-mouse game with criminals,” he said. “We expect the same kind of activity with massage parlors. Criminals are going to continue with their behavior. It’s just a matter of finding a place where they can continue doing it.”
The state Board of Massage Therapy regulates businesses advertising “massage.” When people perform massages without a massage therapy license, the Macon-based board can write a cease-and-desist letter and fine people for later violations, said the board’s executive director, Brig Zimmerman.
The fines max out at $500 per offense. A review of two years of board minutes did not show any fines for businesses violating a cease-and-desist order.
In Friday’s only hearing in Macon, the state massage board issued a cease-and-desist letter to a man who had been giving chair massages in the middle of the Gwinnett Place Mall. Through a friend translating from Chinese, the man said he was a massage-school graduate who didn’t know he needed a license.
State Sen. Cecil Staton, R-Macon, has proposed tougher regulations that would turn a third violation of state regulations into a felony charge. Staton said cities and counties are free to regulate massage parlors as businesses.
Silver said his group thinks such business-license restrictions are a “no-brainer” and was surprised they weren’t quickly passed a year and a half ago, when they were proposed. He predicted regulations in Macon and Bibb County wouldn’t eliminate problems with massage parlors but could reduce them to a more “normal” level.
Silver said Macon has about 18 times as many massage parlors per resident as Washington, D.C.
“Right now this is growing like kudzu, and this criminal industry won’t stop growing until Macon decides to do something about it,” Silver said. “We’re not going to get rid of murder, we’re not going to get rid of robbery, we’re not going to get rid of pedophilia. You aim to fight these things and reduce them as much as possible, so they’re no longer doing harm to great numbers of people.”
To contact writer Mike Stucka, call 744-4251.
Other Georgia cities say massage parlor regulations effective - Related stories - Macon.com
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