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 Nationwide
Increase in Teen Prostitution
Nationwide Increase in Teen Prostitution; Trends Show
Kids Getting Younger, More from Middle-Class Homes Over the last
year, local and federal law-enforcement officials say they have
noted a marked increase in teen prostitution in cities across
the country, reports Assistant Editor Suzanne Smalley in the
August 18 issue of Newsweek.
Newsweek, August 18,
2003
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"Everyone Thinks
They Are Runaways with Drug Problems from the Inner City...It's
Not True, This Could Be Your Kid," Says Detective
Over the last year, local and federal law-enforcement officials
say they have noted a marked increase in teen prostitution in
cities across the country, reports Assistant Editor Suzanne
Smalley in the August 18 issue of Newsweek (on newsstands
Monday, August 11). Law-enforcement agencies and advocacy groups
that work with teen prostitutes say they are increasingly
alarmed by the trend lines: the kids are getting younger;
according to the FBI, the average age of a new recruit is just
13; some are as young as 9. And, while the vast majority of teen
prostitutes today are runaways, illegal immigrants and children
of poor urban areas, experts say a growing number now come from
middle-class homes.
"Compared to
three years ago, we've seen a 70 percent increase in kids are
from middle- to upper-middle- lass backgrounds, many of whom
have not suffered mental, sexual or physical abuse," says Frank
Barnaba of the Paul & Lisa Program, which works with the Justice
Department and the FBI in tracking exploited kids.
Child advocates
are especially concerned that pimps are increasingly targeting
girls at the local mall, a place many parents consider a haven
for their kids to gather after school and on weekends. "Ten
years ago you didn't see this happening," says Bob Flores, who
heads the Justice Department's Office of Juvenile Justice and
Delinquency Prevention. "We've got kids in every major city and
in suburbia all over the place being prostituted." "Potentially
good sex is a small price to pay for the freedom to spend money
on what I want," says 17-year-old Stacey [not her real name],
who liked to hang out after school at the Mall of America,
Minnesota's vast shopping megaplex, Newsweek reports. After
being approached last summer by a man who told her how pretty
she was, and asked if he could buy her some clothes, Stacey
agreed and went home that night with a $250 outfit.
Stacey, who
lives with her parents in an upscale neighborhood, began
stripping for men in hotel rooms -- then went on to more
intimate activities. She placed ads on a local telephone
personals service, offering "wealthy, generous" men "an evening
of fun" for $400. (The Mall of America, whose spokesman declined
to comment, has an extensive security operation, and rules
requiring juveniles to have chaperones on weekend evenings.
Law-enforcement officials, who praise the mall's efforts to
combat the problem, nonetheless concede pimps are active there.
"The Mall of America is a huge recruiting center," says FBI
Special Agent Eileen Jacob.)
Child advocates
are just as worried about, and puzzled by, girls like Stacey,
who aren't forced into prostitution but instead appear to sell
themselves for thrills, or money, or both. Richard Estes, a
University of Pennsylvania researcher, says so-called designer
sex is becoming more common in cities across the country.
"Everyone thinks they are runaways with drug problems from the
inner city," says Andy Schmidt, a Minneapolis detective who
helped bust a major Twin Cities prostitution ring. "It's not
true. This could be your kid." In response, local, state and
federal officials are starting to clamp down on the crime, which
is still treated as a minor offense in many cities. The FBI,
working with the National Center of Missing and Exploited
Children, recently identified 13 cities-including Los Angeles,
Las Vegas, New York, Chicago, Miami, Minneapolis and Dallas-that
have juvenile-prostitution problems.
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