British National Party members outside of Liverpool Crown Court as 9 gang members sentenced for child exploitation.
Prostitution around the world is linked to organized crime. In Las Vegas massage parlors, pay day loan stores, and escort agency prostitution are known to be run by organized criminals. Across the United States, massage parlors are destination points for trafficking victims. In locations with decriminalized or legalized prostitution (e.g. New Zealand, the Netherlands and Australia) legal pimps partner with organized crime to increase their profits.
Julie Bindel’s article highlights the relationship between prostitution and organized crime–and the way in which gangs select, manipulate and groom victims for sexual exploitation. She notes the societal complacency about organized sexual exploitation, which is increasingly problematic as we look at the increase of organized crime in areas in which prostitution is legal.
Bindel suggests that we listen to survivors in order to further understand organized crime–how gangs operate, where they prostitute victims, and what happens to the money they make–in order to better protect victims and secure convictions against perpetrators.
Click here to read Julie Bindel’s article
This organized crime involvement means most women in prostitution are dealing with networks of people who profit off their commercial sexual exploitation and can enforce any threat. And politically powerful, wealthy men are interacting with these criminals to buy women and girls in prostitution.