INDIANAPOLIS —
The Indiana Attorney General’s campaign to fast-track legislation to combat human trafficking will soon include a new target: Patrons of prostitutes whose demand for purchased sex fuels the illicit flesh trade.
A public awareness campaign themed with a buyers-beware message is in development, driven by concerns that the 2012 Super Bowl will spur an increased demand for commercial sex in the host city of Indianapolis.
The goal is to increase awareness of a billion-dollar criminal enterprise and to convey the message that prostitution isn’t a victimless crime.
“We need a change in attitude, particularly among men, that patronizing a prostitute is OK,” said Indiana Attorney General Greg Zoeller. “It’s not.”
The effort is part of a larger initiative launched by the National Association of Attorneys General in June to combat what they see as a growing problem of human trafficking that forces vulnerable people — especially children and illegal immigrants — into the sex trade. The U.S. State Department estimates the global sex trade exploits about 1 million minors every year, with an increasing number in the U.S.
Zoeller said many are victimized, threatened with violence, fearful of prosecution, or, in the case of illegal immigrants, fearful they’ll be arrested and deported.
“It’s modern-day slavery,” Zoeller said.
In Indiana, the focus of the anti-human trafficking initiative centers on the Super Bowl and accompanying week of parties and festivities that prosecutors like Zoeller say attract prostitutes and their profiteering bosses.
Two years ago, Miami police estimated as many as 10,000 prostitutes flooded the city when it hosted the Super Bowl; two men were prosecuted and convicted by federal authorities after they ran an ad on Craigslist’s Miami board advertising sex with a 14-year-old girl as a “Super Bowl Special.”
In January — just weeks before the 2011 game — the Texas Attorney General declared the Super Bowl as “one of the biggest human-trafficking events in the United States,” when he announced he’d beefed up a unit assigned to investigate traffickers of underage prostitutes and sex workers brought in from Central America.
Fearing a similar Super Bowl scenario, Zoeller has asked state legislators to fast-track legislation when they convene in January that would make the sex trafficking of children a separate crime and enhance penalties for those who profit from it.
But in addition, Zoeller’s staff, lead by Deputy Attorney General Abby Kuzma, is also working with state and local officials on a public awareness campaign with a primary message that sex trafficking exists because buyers create the demand that fuels the prostitution industry.
The Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department has created a website, soon to be launched, that aims to counter the visiting sex trade with resources for its victims and warnings for potential patrons that “prostitution is illegal,” said IMPD spokeswoman Linda Jackson.
Zoeller and Jackson declined to give details on what more is to come, but past preventative efforts in other Super Bowl states may offer some clues. Before the last Super Bowl, Texas police used an electronic billboard near the Dallas Cowboys stadium to post mug shots of men arrested for patronizing prostitutes, featuring the message: “Dear John, You Never Know! This could be you.”
Local Dallas TV stations also ran public service announcements like the one recorded by Dallas Cowboy Jay Ratliff delivering the message: “If you’re one of these men buying these young girls, I’m telling you that real men don’t buy children. They don’t buy sex.”
Zoeller said the campaign to combat sex trafficking has to go beyond law enforcement and echo Ratliff’s message. He said men in particular need to adopt a zero-tolerance policy when it comes to the casual attitudes and what he called “locker-room humor‚” that trivializes prostitution. “As men, we have to step up and say we don’t condone it,” Zoeller said.
Maureen Hayden is Statehouse bureau chief for the Tribune-Star. She can be reached at maureen.hayden@indianamediagroup.com
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