HOUSTON – Human and sex trafficking in Houston is a problem, and the Bissonnet track is well-known around the country. Law enforcement and prosecutors are changing tactics to do what they can to combat the illegal trade.
Because of the new tactics, KPRC 2 Investigates looked at the numbers to see where the illicit trade is moving.
To see the sex trade firsthand, KPRC 2 hit the streets with Hope Over Hurt. It’s the second time this year we did this. This time, they went to Tidwell and I-69.
“I call it a quick pivot. The streets know how to pivot and, you know, the word gets out really quick,” says founder Wendi Turner.
The pivot comes months after Houston police cracked down on the Bissonnet prostitution track.
KPRC 2 Investigates was the first to report on the literal roadblocks HPD set up to stop the trade.
“It’s a never-ending pursuit for us. That’s an area that I think we excel in,” said Commander Salam Zia, who heads the HPD Vice Unit.
While there are successes with cleaning up Bissonnet, he confirms our suspicions the sex trade is moving to other parts of Houston.
KPRC 2′s Rilwan Balogun showed him a map with the latest statistics.
“I just want to make sure the things we’re looking at look correct to you. These are arrests from September of last year to this September,” Rilwan said.
“So, you got northeast, you got southeast, this is the Bissonnet area. That doesn’t mean it’s not occurring in other areas,” Zia responded.
On the map, the highest number of arrests came from the Bissonnet area with 282 arrests. Some of those numbers deal with the HPD crackdown.
Then we move to northeast Houston, with 183 arrests, and to southeast Houston, with 141.
“We have shifted our focus and tried to attack the problem wherever it is. We are working with patrol commanders in various parts of the city, and trying to take some of the successes we had in Bissonnet and apply them in those areas,” Zia said.
Once the arrests are made, the case moves to the Harris County District Attorney’s Office where the Human Trafficking and Child Exploitation Chief Luke Baty and his team begin prosecuting.
“I can charge somebody with trafficking, but I can also charge somebody with sexual assault of a child or possession of child pornography. And, I can charge all of those things under one umbrella. And so, the charging decisions are a complex decision-making process,” says Baty.
Prosecutors are aggressively going after the pimps and johns, or whatever you want to call them. They are doing all this while trying to get the sex workers out of the trade.
“There’s nobody who’s in that life consensually,” the prosecutor adds.
Looking at the same September to September timeframe, Harris County prosecutors saw 1,370 cases of human trafficking and prostitution. Most of that was handled by HPD.
Of those cases, 94 had prior prostitution charges, and there were only 72 convictions.
The reasoning behind that is a change in perception, law enforcement, and prosecutors are now viewing sex workers as victims.
Baty said, “Nobody’s consenting to being on the street because they just wanted to do that for their whole life. Some circumstances have led them to that position.”
That’s where Hope Over Hurt comes in, they advocate for those being trafficked and are there when the victims are ready to get out.
“So, from the heart, it hurts because we see dreams that diverted some that probably had visions,” says member Nzinga Rideaux. “They wanted to do more and be more but fell prey to it. And, some have given up. And this is where they are right now.”
There is a misconception out there that because the numbers surrounding prostitution are high, Houston has a major problem. The reality is that working with nonprofits, law enforcement, and prosecutors leads to a better reporting system. One other part of the country is now working to model.