4 Calif. Officers To Be Fired In Wake Of Bay Area Sex Scandal

By Javier Panzar
Los Angeles Times

RICHMOND, Calif. — Four more Bay Area police officers will be fired as a result of an investigation into allegations made by a teenage sex-trafficking victim who said she slept with dozens of law enforcement officers.

Richmond City Manager Bill Lindsay on Sunday said the four officers will be fired after a city investigation found “documented misconduct” between the officers and the victim. Five other officers will be given official reprimands.

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St. Paul Man Sentenced to 20 Years on Sex Trafficking Charge

October 31, 2016 11:11 AM

A St. Paul man has been sentenced to 20 years in prison for prostituting a teenage girl.

Forty-one-year-old Damon DiMartino was sentenced Friday on a first-degree sex trafficking charge.

According to the criminal complaint, police responded to a domestic disturbance call last fall and later learned that the person who made the complaint was a 17-year-old who was being prostituted. The girl told police that she had been kicked out of her mother’s home in June and had been living with friends.

Read more from St Paul Eyewitness News 

FBI Arrests 21 Accused In Georgia Sex Trafficking Sting Operation Cross Country X

Twenty-one people from Georgia face human trafficking charges after an undercover sting involving state and local law enforcement, according to the FBI’s Atlanta Field Office.

The arrests included the capture of two Floridians in Atlanta who were wanted on charges of murder and sex trafficking in the case of a 14-year-old girl.

According to a news release, the FBI’s Metro Atlanta Child Exploitation Task Force arrested 54 adult prostitutes, seized nine firearms and saved one juvenile from sex trafficking in addition to the alleged pimp arrests.

The sting was part of Operation Cross Country X, an international operation focused on human sex trafficking. This year, officials were able to rescue 82 minors and arrested 239 traffickers, according to the release.

Read more from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution

5 Arrested After FBI, Local Law Enforcement Conduct Anti-Human Trafficking Bust

BIRMINGHAM, AL (WBRC) - 

The FBI's Birmingham office says that multiple people have been arrested in connection to Operation Cross Country X (OCC X), an initiative aimed at stopping underage human trafficking.
The Shelby County Sheriff's Office has identified several suspects arrested in their area and released their charges:

• Kheliam Jamar Rountree: Human trafficking, child endangerment, second degree unlawful possession of marijuana
• Aaron Lee Byrd, Jr.: Human trafficking, obstruction of justice
• Elaina Josephine Logan: Promoting prostitution
• Devon Johnson: Promoting prostitution
• Terkeria Sherell Simmons: Chemical endangerment of a child, second degree unlawful possession of marijuana

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New Orleans Human Trafficking Victims Says Backpage Website A Major Factor In New Orleans Human Trafficking

Just over half of the New Orleans human trafficking victims seeking help at Covenant House over the past six months were featured in prostitution ads on the website Backpage, whose CEO was arrested on pimping charges Thursday (Oct. 6), a Covenant House official says.


And of those 16 human trafficking victims, 11 worked in New Orleans strip clubs, said Shari Lockridge, a case worker at Covenant House. Some of them were recruited through the strip clubs and then began exchanging money for sex, often at the behest of a pimp who would maintain the ads and coordinate the flow of customers to the woman.

The Times Picayune has more

Backpage Ceo Arrested On Sex Trafficking Charges

Oct. 6, 2016: This photo released by the Texas Office of the Attorney General shows Backpage CEO Carl Ferrer. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton alleges that adult and child sex-trafficking victims had been forced into prostitution through escort ads posted on the site.  (Texas Office of the Attorney General via AP)



DALLAS –  State agents raided the Dallas headquarters of adult classified ad portal Backpage and arrested Chief Executive Officer Carl Ferrer on Thursday following allegations that adult and child sex-trafficking victims had been forced into prostitution through escort ads posted on the site.

Ferrer, 55, was arrested on a California warrant after arriving at Houston's Bush Intercontinental Airport on a flight from Amsterdam, said Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton. In a statement, Paxton said agents from his Law Enforcement Unit participated in a search of Backpage headquarters and Ferrer's arrest.

"Making money off the backs of innocent human beings by allowing them to be exploited for modern-day slavery is not acceptable in Texas. I intend to use every resource my office has to make sure those who profit from the exploitation and trafficking of persons are held accountable to the fullest extent of the law," Paxton, a Republican, said in a statement.

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South Dakota AG Joins Sex Trafficking Fight

 (CN) — South Dakota Attorney General Marty Jackley, along with 20 of his counterparts in others states, has added his name to an amicus brief filed in hopes of holding Backpage.com liable for sex trafficking.

     The brief was filed in the Supreme Court case of Doe v. Backpage.com, and says the Communications Decency Act (CDA) does not shield website operators from liability when they use language designed to attract sex traffickers in advertisements.

     The First Circuit previously upheld a dismissal of the case by U.S. District Judge Richard Stearns in Boston.

     Three underage women claimed the website allowed advertisements for their trafficking in its "escorts" section.

Read more from  Courthouse News Service