Mary Pember: Changing attitudes on trafficking of Native girls

The business of sex trafficking young girls is a highly organized criminal enterprise in which brutality and cruelty are tools of the trade. Native American girls who can be easily passed off to represent a variety of ethnicities, are especially prized in this burgeoning market.

A recent study “Mapping the Market for Sex with Trafficked Minor Girls in Minneapolis: Structures, Functions and Patterns,” reveals how pimps and gangs ruthlessly sort and prepare their “product” (young girls) for maximum financial return. Lauren Martin and Sandi Pierce are the two lead researchers of the report.

One example of such systemic brutality is the use of “trap houses,” a variation on the brothel theme usually located in abandoned houses for short-term use. Girls are invited to come party, given free drugs and alcohol and eventually trapped and forced to have sex with large groups of men hosting/attending the party. Typically trap houses cater to neighborhood specific male groups of lower income sex buyers. The researchers found that this can also be a recruiting tactic by gangs and mostly attracts younger men. Some facilitators running such operations post ads online and texts alerting customers to such parties. In addition to “breaking the girls,” trap houses are sometimes used as placement of girls deemed to be of less earning potential by gang operations.

One interview reported, “A Native American girl was set up to be gang raped by her boyfriend who was involved in Native gangs. She was taken to an abandoned warehouse for a party, was drugged through the punch she drank, and was raped by many men.”