By Jaime Ortega.
The U.S. federal authorities released this weekend 105 minors under a network of sexual exploitation, as announced by the deputy director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in Washington.
This is the biggest operation against child prostitution developed by the agency so far and was carried out for 72 hours in 76 cities, where they arrested a total of 150 people.
“Sexual exploitation is a threat to all children of our country,” acknowledged the FBI Deputy Director, Ron Hosko, on monday during a press conference in the capital. “We’re talking about one of the most persistent crimes on the streets of our cities.”
The FBI initiative named “Lost Innocense”, is to investigate the disappearance of children in the U.S. and bring their captors to justice, as they have released more than 2,700 children since its founding a decade ago.
According to data provided by Rosko, 1,300 people have been sentenced to prison for child trafficking and sexual exploitation in all this time, with sentences ranging from 15 to 50 years in prison and 10 death sentences.
U.S. officials say that most vulnerable children are between 13 and 16 years and fit the definition of “child with a vacuum” as they called the experts. “The kidnapper identifies that void in his victim and tries to fill it with different strategies,” said Hosko. “Once the child has fallen through the net, then start sexual exploitation.”
60% also fled or disappeared when they were with host families, which further hinders their finding.
According to the deputy director of the FBI, most victims released this weekend were between 13 and 17 years-of-age, but have come to retrieve less than nine years old. “This is one of the biggest challenges we face in this country,” said Hosko.
The FBI is working with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children in the identification and recovery of child victims of prostitution. “Operators are sold at truck stops on highways or through child pornography websites,” said the center’s director, John Ryan. “It is a problem present in all cities.”
The authorities revealed that the operation “Cross Country VII” identified among other places the selling of minors in key points on several cities, road stops, motels, casinos and various websites and social networks. Among the cities where the raids took place, according to the list shared by the FBI, are Detroit, Michigan, Denver, Colorado, and San Francisco and San Diego, in the State of California.
Those responsible for the operation argue that one of the biggest problems when children find is that a large majority of them have no family members who have denounced their absence. 60% also fled or disappeared when they were with host families, which further hinders their find.
“We are talking about young people without family or whose family structure is broken, in most cases had no complaints about their disappearance,” Ryan lamented. According to the director, some of the victims fall into prostitution when they turn 18, when they must leave the shelters. “Some of the networks identified victims from the day they enter the social service system to be taken to foster homes, so our monitoring methods still have much to improve,” he said.
The head of FBI operations against child prostitution acknowledged Monday that they have managed to increase the level of public awareness regarding the risks of missing children in both rural and large cities, particularly through advertising campaigns in large sporting events, but there is still work to do. “We still have many children to recover from operating networks and likewise bring their captors to justice,” said Hosko
