Sky News obtains exclusive access to an undercover vice operation aimed at tackling child prostitution in the United States.
05:53, UK, Wednesday 06 April 2016
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Police in Los Angeles are trying a radical new approach to tackle the epidemic of child prostitution.
Vice officers in America's second largest city say treating teenagers as victims rather than criminals gives them the best chance of rebuilding their lives away from the streets.Sky News joined LA vice squad's small human trafficking unit in an undercover operation on "the tracks" in south central Los Angeles. They offered help and counselling to young women working as prostitutes.
One undercover officer told Sky News: "There's no such thing as child prostitution. They are victims. Many of them don't realise they are.
"By putting them through the court process we are just re-victimising them. We now deem this a rescue and recovery operation."
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Police often find the girls reluctant to defy their pimp or trafficker because, as one officer put it: "The consequences can be pretty severe".
'Sandy' says her journey to a life of prostitution began when she was nine and her mother sold her for sex to pay for drugs.
She is now 17 and has completed her education thanks to the work of a shelter called Children of the Night in Van Nuys, north of Los Angeles.
She told Sky News: "There's a bunch of young girls that go into prostitution because it is easier and fast money and that's what everyone wants.
"No one wants to sit there and work a 9-to-5 job earning $500 a week when you can earn $1,000 a day."
But as 'Sandy' prepared to return to her home life, she said she could not rule out returning to prostitution.
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"That's why girls go into prostitution, because no one cares about us. My parents didn't care about me, where else was there to go?"
The shelter, founded in a former post office with a grant from Playboy founder Hugh Hefner, has helped 10,000 teenagers over the last 30 years.
Founder Dr Lois Lee disagrees with the new police approach because young women "don't know the word trafficking applies to them".
She said: "Child prostitution starts at home. The answer is to identify these children at birth through uniform drug testing, so they never hit the crack house, to give mother the chance to pull herself together."
At the nearby Van Nuys police station, commanding officer Captain Lillian Carranza told Sky News: "Children are the victims. This is, in essence, modern day slavery."
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