At the forefront of a national push to hold johns accountable, the Sheriff's Department has an innovative approach to gathering information on traffickers
A girl talks about her friend who’s being sold out of a motel room on game days in Eugene.
A sex trafficker keeps tabs on his victim as he runs his enterprise from the jail telephone system.
These two recorded conversations inspired Sgt. Molly McDade Hood of the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Department to propose the creation of a special unit to use intelligence collected at the jail to assist in identifying sex traffickers, purchasers and victims.
“I heard this young man in custody having a conversation with his girlfriend, and she was talking about a young girl who was being transported to Eugene by her boyfriend, who was a trafficker,” McDade Hood said. “The girl’s mom thought she was going down there to see the games.
“The girl wouldn’t come home with money. Instead, she’d come home with gift cards, purses, make-up and things like that, so it was never really on her mom’s radar.”
McDade Hood suspected the victim who was being trafficked was a middle school student.
In the second call, McDade Hood heard an inmate, who was about to be sentenced to 13 years in federal prison, running trafficking jobs from jail.
“He was calling the shots, telling the girl where to go and where to make moves,” McDade Hood said. “He didn’t even have to be there. She was probably in so deep – she knew no different – and knew she was going to make money for him or there’d be consequences when he got out, which is a scary thing.”
The sergeant said she brought these calls up to her captain in 2008, and they decided to pursue a federal justice assistance grant (JAG) in 2009 in cooperation with the Portland Police Department and the Multnomah County District Attorney’s Office. The grant funded Multnomah County’s now nationally recognized jail intelligence unit.
Today, McDada Hood serves as the human trafficking jail intelligence sergeant.
“We have valuable information here in the jail that can assist in prosecuting cases,” she said. “On an average day, I look to see who we have in custody. I hop from one case to the next to see who I should have a conversation with, or whose tattoos I want to take pictures of.”
An inmate’s tattoo placement and content can be indicators of sex trafficking involvement. McDade Hood said while taking pictures of inmates’ markings, she has the opportunity to get to know victims and traffickers who come through the jail.
“I don’t talk to them about their case; I tell them that right off the bat,” she said. “I might say, ‘Tell me about your life. Who are your mom and dad? Do you have kids? Who’s your significant other?’
“We don’t want to re-traumatize the victims. We don’t force people to reveal their stories until they decide what they want to do,” she said.
McDade Hood said victims often are well into their 20s before they are ready to leave “the life.” Many will refuse help initially and then contact her later about available services.
“Every one of these cases is really complicated, and they take a long time,” she said. “There’s a lot of emotion involved, especially when there is trauma-bonding with the trafficker.
“Someone might say, ‘I’ve been working with this guy and we’ve been doing this as part of a team,’ which is part of the manipulation,” the sergeant said. “‘It’s been X amount of years, and I don’t even have an apartment anymore. I have no money in savings. I’ve slept with thousands and thousands of men, and I’ve made him a ton of money, and I have nothing.’”
FURTHER READING: Portland curriculum helps students identify sex trafficking, exploitive relationships
Reaching out to break the cycle
McDade Hood said connecting with victims while they are being held in jail on various charges has to be done in a safe way. She doesn’t want traffickers to suspect that victims are talking to law enforcement by choice. Ironically, it’s often the traffickers who open up to McDade Hood.
“I’ve never had someone not talk to me,” she said. “We are victim-centered, but I believe when we start to dig deep, we’ll see that traffickers have also lived traumatic lives. Plus, many of the more manipulative traffickers have lived that way to survive.”
McDade Hood believes more intervention and anti-trafficking education need to happen well before these men turn 18, but it’s difficult to sway them away from the industry when all they see is endless supply and demand.
“The risk is too low, and the money is too good,” she said about traffickers’ attitudes. Unlike drugs and guns, they can sell “their product” repeatedly and don’t have to be at the scene of the crime.
Following the trail of evidence
McDade Hood gathers information about traffickers’ networks through the day-to-day paperwork processed in the jail. The sergeant might see a certain runaway report or notice that a victim has a criminal history with a known trafficker.
“It’s like a spiderweb of connectivity,” she said. “I look at any other indicators I might have.”
She has attended three of the last four Super Bowls to assist law enforcement with sex trafficking jail intelligence. In Atlanta, she and other analysts looked at how many inmates and prisoners from facilities located near the game were making calls to individuals actively posting escort ads, assuming they were arranging sex trafficking jobs.
McDade Hood said they looked at nearly 135,000 unique calls and found that 2% of calls from the jails went to individuals with posted ads, 1% from the prison system.
“Anywhere there’s disposable income and a large number of people, especially from out of town or online, there’s going to be the sale of sex,” McDade Hood said. “There’s also a better likelihood there will be minors there to be exploited. You’re going to have the sale of sex in Atlanta, Portland, La Grande, Medford and Bend.”
McDade Hood said victims’ relatives have been known to be traffickers.
“It’s a shock to people’s social conscience to think that a mom could show her daughter how to charge for sex, how to rent a room when she’s 14, walk a track or post an ad.
“Sometimes, it’s not the mom’s free will. She may already be in ‘the life,’ and her significant other tells her that the daughter is going to be the next money-maker.”
FURTHER READING: Group busts myths, builds relationships with young sex-trafficking victims
Sending traffickers to prison
One of local law enforcement’s big success stories with prosecuting sex traffickers in Portland is the Moncello L. James case. He was sentenced in March 2018 to more than 17 years in prison after being found guilty of multiple counts of compelling and promoting prostitution.
James was trafficking from both outside and inside the Multnomah County Justice Center. Jail intelligence and a willing witness helped detectives in their nearly yearlong investigation into James, who also had been convicted of pimping and pandering in California.
James has a profile on the “write-a-prisoner” pen pal site and a personal prisoner blog that states, “I’m single and looking to meet new friends and see what happens.”
The jury’s decision to sentence him to 210 months in prison was welcome news to the five local law enforcement groups that helped bring him to justice, including McDade Hood’s unit.
“This job will hopefully outlive me here,” she said. “There’s such a connectivity among domestic violence, gang issues, sexual violence and sex trafficking. As a county, it’s something we’re always looking at – all those intersections.”
At the time of this interview, the sergeant said the jail had 12 suspects in custody who had been indicted on sex trafficking-related charges and an estimated 12 to 15 sex trafficking victims.
Multnomah County jail intelligence statistics from December 2018 show that at least 595 minors and 1,191 adults are believed to be victims of sex trafficking in the Portland metro area. More than 1,000 people have been suspected or prosecuted as traffickers, while 949 have been charged with purchasing. McDade Hood said the numbers are based on citations.
Going after purchasers
With the 2018 statistic that nearly 1,000 people have been charged with purchasing in the Portland area, McDade Hood and her team of interns from Portland State University are hoping to launch a new research project to discover more information about local buyers, also known as “johns.”
McDade Hood said purchasers come from all parts of society; they can be doctors, attorneys, police officers, business people and school teachers. Although the idea for a research study is still in the early stages, she expects a proposal to be ready by summer.
Multnomah County is at the forefront of a national movement to prioritize the arrest and prosecution of buyers to help reduce demand for sex-trafficked youths and adults.
“There are many agencies in the U.S. that don’t touch the buyers,” McDade Hood said.
Prosecutors with the Multnomah County District Attorney’s Office believe buyers are the crux of the problem.
“As long as there are buyers out there, there will always be traffickers looking for ways to make more money,” said J.R. Ujifusa, senior deputy district attorney, and supervisor of the Multnomah County District Attorney’s Office Human Trafficking Team. “Whether or not you purchase a minor, or try to purchase a minor, it increases demand for recruiting, grooming and the exploitation of minors.”
Ujifusa said purchasing an adult also has implications buyers often don’t consider.
“Even if the purchased woman, or man, is 19, 20 or 23 … they still have that trauma from when they were a minor and first got into this,” he said.
SBAD program takes shape
In an effort to decrease demand for sex trafficking in the Portland area, in 2010, Multnomah County leaders researched the idea of a special program to educate sex buyers about how their actions affect victims, community members and their own health and families.
“John schools” aren’t a new concept, but Ujifusa said Multnomah County wanted its new Sex Buyers Accountability and Diversion, or SBAD, program to go even further, by drawing on the experience of researchers, social service agencies, survivors, medical professionals and law enforcement. He said having survivors tell their stories is especially powerful.
County leaders sought advice for the program from a nationally known researcher, Michael Shively from Abt Associates, who’s been the lead researcher on a number of National Institute of Justice studies on john schools and reducing demand for sex trafficking.
Shively helped create an overview of anti-demand tactics used around the country and found that john schools did indeed have a significant effect on reducing the recidivism rate for men who purchased or tried to purchase sex. County officials considered Shively’s research and advice as they created SBAD.
“We learned there are two kinds of buyers when it comes to purchasing adults,” Ujifusa said, “those who are ignorant or unaware of their actions and how their actions affect sex trafficking and those who are only concerned about themselves.”
The SBAD program is available to those charged with a misdemeanor for purchasing or trying to purchase an adult. First-time offenders who complete the eight-hour, $1,000 course can get their charge dismissed. Eight hundred men have completed the program since it began in 2011.
“It really tries to open up their minds, and eyes, about traffickers, quotas and the fact that it may appear that these individuals want to do this, or are willing to do this, but there may be other things going on behind the scenes,” Ujifusa said.
The program is not available to anyone who purchases, or attempts to purchase, a minor – which is a felony.
“Most of the time in those cases we’re looking at sex offender registration and treatment, as well as prison-type sentences, because those individuals are either seeking out or don’t care whether or not they’re purchasing minors.”
Ujifusa said the Multnomah County District Attorney’s Office worked diligently with Oregon lawmakers to make the charge of sex with a minor a felony. Before that, it had been a misdemeanor. In addition to the sex with a minor charge, buyers may face charges of sexual assault, online enticement, luring or child pornography.
Even though it’s been years since McDade Hood first heard those recorded phone calls about sex trafficking, she is still shocked by what she sees and hears.
“I’m still surprised every single day. I just don’t know how people can cause such havoc to other individuals,” she said. “That mental manipulation is so hard on people. I believe people heal from the bruises a lot easier than their mental scars.”
GET HELP OR LEARN MORE
For more information on efforts to stop sex trafficking in the Portland area, visit the Multnomah County Sex Trafficking Collaborative’s website. If you or someone you know needs help, the Call to Safety crisis line offers 24-hour assistance at 888-235-5333.
© 2019 Street Roots. All rights reserved. | To request permission to reuse content, email editor@streetroots.org or call 503-228-5657, ext. 404.
Street Roots is an award-winning, nonprofit, weekly newspaper focusing on economic, environmental and social justice issues. Our newspaper is sold in Portland, Oregon, by people experiencing homelessness and/or extreme poverty as means of earning an income with dignity. Learn more about Street Roots.
Street Roots is funded by individual readers like you. Support your community newspaper by making a one-time or recurring gift today.
