CATHERINE CORTEZ-MASTO
UPDATE 9/30/15 - I found this today about Catherine Cortez Masto. Evidently she's been in a film about corruption - https://nevadastatepersonnelwatch.wordpress.com/2012/07/28/nevada-anti-corruption-movement-to-be-featured-in-lawless-america-the-movie-the-movie-will-expose-judicial-corruption-and-government-corruption-for-the-world-to-see/
Back to my blog post:
Since I'm talking about my experiences with the candidates right now - my daughter read me a campaign email she got about Kamala Harris and Catherine Masto-Cortez. Why am I not surprised they're lumped together? Well I wrote about my experience, or lack of experience I should say, with Kamala here http://traffickingandprostitutionservices.blogspot.com/2015/09/kamala-harris.html and I wrote about David Vitter here http://traffickingandprostitutionservices.blogspot.com/2015/09/david-vitter.html and John Hambrick here - http://traffickingandprostitutionservices.blogspot.com/2015/09/letter-i-wrote-today-to-office-of.html
As I'm looking at their campaigns - I see the same note running through it. That of "family values". Let me first cite my experience a moment with the people who are backing these candidates. I'm going to cite the lawsuit of the ACLU vs. the Catholic Bishops. https://www.aclu.org/blog/first-circuit-court-should-defend-victims-human-trafficking and also the Supreme Court case that had to be fought over the lives, and bodies, of women in this country. http://www.scotusblog.com/case-files/cases/agency-for-international-development-v-alliance-for-open-society-international-inc/
BACKGROUND
I'm also going to show you a letter I wrote to the Catholic Church and the Salvation Army (no I haven't got a response back yet). http://traffickingandprostitutionservices.blogspot.com/2015/09/letter-to-catholic-bishops-and.html
When I started the movement for sex trafficking victims to get help in this country - it was with this in mind. First, the sex industry is just that - an industry. It's an industry no different than farming, manufacturing, hospitality, fishing, etc. Other industries like these sometimes have trafficking victims forced to work in those industries.
I am not saying this as a moral statement - just a fact. If you look at the porn industry alone - it employs a lot of people. You have the performers yes. But you also have the photographers, the editors, the sound people, the graphic designers, and then comes the marketing people. Take one look at the AVN Awards and you will see how big the porn industry is. In the 1980's - I'd be willing to bet just about every man on this planet knew who Linda Lovelace and Marilyn Chambers were.
Look at the strip club industry that's a part of the sex industry. You have dancers yes. So while these church teams are out trying to tell the dancers that "Jesus loves them" - there's also the bartenders, the waitresses, the DJ's, the doormen, the bouncers, etc. They have bookkeepers, and they buy alcohol for the bar, and food for the snacks, and they hire cooks and cleaning crews. They buy light systems and sound systems and even hire interior designers to design the look of their clubs. They buy signs and office supplies and pay taxes.
Now take a look at Mally Mall who had his house recently raided - and now tell me this is not an "industry". The man is on a show on Vh1. He has a record company, as well he runs an outcall service in Las Vegas. He makes enough money to live in a million dollar home, buy exotic animals, and guess what? He employs, and works with a lot of people. He's not only part of the record industry - but also the sex industry which often overlaps. Look at Snoop Dogg's confession he was pimping at the same time he was touring in his Rolling Stone confession.
So stop looking at this as a MORAL issue. You want to get MORAL on me? A lot of people have died from alcoholism. Yet the alcohol industry is alive and well and an INDUSTRY. Do I have relatives who DIED from alcohol? Yes. What about the tobacco industry? My mother smoked four packs a day of cigarettes until she died because her lungs were like paper the doctors told me. So tobacco killed my mother. Do I agree with tobacco? No I don't smoke. But it's STILL AN INDUSTRY.
Now you don't AGREE with the sex industry - power to you. The FACT remains it's an INDUSTRY. An industry that within it sometimes trafficks people. If you look at the DEA owned strip club in NJ - those dancers were illegals and they were being trafficked in that club. How? They had family back in Colombia. Family that if they stepped out of line - the drug cartel owned police would have done something to their family before they could even get on a plane here in the states. The DEA guys who owned that club were a stone's throw supposedly to the White House. They supposedly made jokes about "inviting Obama and the Secret Service down to the club". It was reported that many people in law enforcement and politics went to that club. A club where those women could no more go to a Salvation Army or a Catholic Charities shelter for safe haven than fly.
That's my issue. First of all, street prostitutes, street pimps, junkies - that's not sex trafficking. Is that force? Yes. But it's more of a drug addiction and domestic violence issue than it is sex trafficking. Nor is it about the sex industry. There are strip clubs operating right now where the women dancing there are not being forced to dance there, nor is their money being taken from them for dancing at that club. There are "independent operators" in the sex industry that are there by choice, and it's their career, and no one is forcing them to do or say anything.
So number one. I'm not trying to stamp out the sex industry anymore than I'm going to try and bring back prohibition nor am I trying to get tobacco companies shut down. I don't drink and I don't smoke. Period.
But no one is forcing someone to drink or smoke either that I'm aware of. Now we have a different story. When men, women and children, are being sold like cattle as sex slaves to trafficking rings and/or private owners - we have a problem. We have a problem in that they can't "just say no" number one. Number two, back in the 1970's and 1980's when I first came into the sex industry - I saw no way out for these victims.
Yes I saw shelters for street prostitutes. I saw drug treatment centers for street prostitutes. I saw church outreach programs like the Mary Magdalene Project to get street prostitutes off the streets. However, what I DID NOT SEE was help for sex trafficking victims because we were not recognized as REAL. Meaning if you called the police for help - you would be arrested or ignored. If you went to a counselor for help - you would either be locked up as hallucinating, or they would simply ignore you. One of the other. We were either treated like criminals, deviants, or ignored.
Now how do we change this? We can't change the system until people believe the issue was real. So we embarked upon a media campaign of talk shows, news shows, interviews, public speaking, shows like 60 Minutes, etc. By 1994 when I moved to Nebraska - I couldn't walk into a gas station or a coffee shop without someone saying 'hey aren't you that Prostitutes Anonymous lady?" Yes I was.
So that led to the Trafficking Act of 2000. Great now we had federal recognition. But that also meant FEDERAL MONEY. Now back when HIV was raging - the jails wanted rid of us. So they handed me prostitutes on a silver plate. Here - get them out of the jails and into your residential programs because our guards don't want to work with them. We got the first home for male prostitutes put together in Los Angeles actually. Then we got one for transgenders because they were having them sleep in the cafeteria because they couldn't put them in the dorms.
Okay now HIV is receding. Guess what? Now we have a system that wants to BUILD bigger newer jails. They want to incarcerate anyone they can get their hands on. Want an easy way to do that? Simply grab a street walker, offer her a choice - say you're a trafficking victim and go into these faith based programs or GO TO JAIL. The jails are filling up - and now they get to build those bigger newer jails. Problem solved for THEM but what about us?
Now I moved to Nevada in 1996 because I'm getting phone calls from victims of sex trafficking who are within the legal brothels of Nevada telling me they CAN'T GET OUT. They are stuck in brothels in tiny little towns that have no cab system, no bus system, no limo system, and they're not old enough to drive, and the police are on the brothel owners' payroll, and the law says they can't walk out of there on their own two feet and hitch out of there - so to get away from their pimp they have to have someone who is going to physically drive a car up to them and get them out of there. Before I made the extreme measure of shutting down my business, closing down my radio show I was producing with very high ratings, and selling off my real estate, and moving my husband and daughter to Nevada - yes I tried to call the police to see if they would help these women. I got nothing.
Why? Because to arrest someone for TRAFFICKING requires an investigation. It requires evidence. It requires paperwork. However, to arrest someone for PROSTITUTION is easy. Even arresting for pimping is easy. You arrest a street prostitute easy. You've seen the stings on TV. Then she says "that's my pimp" and you got an arrest. Easy peesy.
However, to get an arrest for TRAFFICKING is much more complicated. Now with the federal recognition, money was yes going to shelters like the Salvation Army and the Catholic Charities. Who were able to house women while they were prosecuting a case. That's how the government was paying for them to stay.
But then the Catholic Bishops came in and said "well pay for the case management of any woman you put in here who is a prostitute on certain conditions". One of those conditions was huge. It tied into the 2003 TVRA Act. What this meant was that they could not "partner with, associate with, or refer to" anyone who did not have a "written policy against prostitution".
Now this is a whole other story. What this means is this - imagine if you were an alcoholic treatment program. Now imagine that you can only refer the alcoholics in your program to people who were pushing for prohibition. Think about it. You can't let them go to an AA meeting, or read an AA Big Book, or even talk to Bill Wilson. Why? Because Bill Wilson is not on a team that is pushing to outlaw alcohol. If anything, AA can not "express an opinion about an outside issue".
So guess what? In 2004, we were booted out of every single Salvation Army, every Catholic Charity funded program, and the victims were blocked from even speaking to us. The staff was blocked from speaking to us. Why? Not because we were ineffective. In fact, I can show you independent research that even validates we were effective. But because we were not calling to OUTLAW pornography and prostitution.
In fact, by stating that trafficking was a PART of the sex industry, and not the industry as a WHOLE - we were further shunned from the very movement we had created. Now I'm sorry but I can't act out a scene from "Taming of the Shrew" and say the sky is green and the moon is out at noon just because these people are saying it is. Sex work is an industry and no not all workers are victims. Also, as 12 step group no I can not join in the fight against the industry itself because then I lose the very people I'm trying to help AND who is helping me to do that.
Because where on earth do you think our referrals are coming from? Where do alcoholics come from? The bars. Where do smokers come from? From buying tobacco. Where do addicts come from? Many times they come from doctors. So guess where we hear about where sex trafficking is operating? From people in the sex industry. Okay now if I go up against a strip club and try and shut down that club - why on earth would he call me in to help a woman he sees being trafficked? Because they're on the front lines - I'm not. A sober alcoholic is not in the bars anymore. I'm not in the clubs anymore. I'm not in the sex industry anymore. So we rely upon referrals. People who trust we're going to help them and not bring in the cops on them.
So guess where that leaves me suddenly? You guessed it. I'm getting calls from victims needing help - and suddenly my calls aren't being returned from the people who are giving them housing, food donations, clothing donations. Because most of the time when these victims call me - they're running from the pimps and traffickers and have nothing. So from 1987 until 2004 - I've had an informal partnership with these charities. I've had to turn to them for help with getting these men and women housing, food, clothing, etc. To get them on their feet until we can get them working.
What do I do about it? No one will talk to me. So I look for legal action. No lawyer is going to sue on a case where he's not going to win money. So I started writing the ACLU. We win. Now they are court ordered by law to STOP isolating these victims and also ISOLATING from us. Because what was happening was the victims they got were being put in these houses where they were being refused licensed therapists (only allowed pastoral counselors) and also refused any medical visits except when they were pregnant, and then only with doctors who would not discuss birth control nor abortion, which in some cases meant no doctor at all.
Now the Supreme Court decision was not until June of 2013. But the ACLU lawsuit was in 2012. So what happens in February of 2013? These people are fighting for ground. Suddenly I'm seeing trafficking bills popping up all over the country. California, Nevada, Nebraska, Florida, etc. I don't have a paid staff. We don't get grants. This is work I do in my spare time. What do I do? I am taught to "work with what I got" and "do what's in front of you". So this means Nevada.
CATHERINE AND ME
I read the news that Catherine Masto-Cortez has created a trafficking bill and there's going to be hearings on this. Okay great. I write her office, introduce myself, and ask if I might be involved in some manner. I hear nothing back. You can read about AB67 here - http://ag.nv.gov/News/PR/2013/Human_Trafficking/Attorney_General_Masto%E2%80%99s_Sex_Trafficking_Legislation_Passed_by_Nevada_Legislature/
Now when I gave the press conference in 2007 about sex trafficking existing in Nevada even within the legal sex industry - Catherine never introduced herself to me, expressed any interest or support, etc. So we just gave a huge press conference that everyone everywhere across the world heard about - and she doesn't step up to show any interest in the subject, nor our work in Nevada.
But here she is now writing up a Bill to "help" us. Okay so I read the bill and I disagree with it that it's going to help us in any way. In fact, I believe it's going to be quite harmful to us. So I send out a copy of her proposed bill to our membership of Sex Workers Anonymous. I hadn't done a count of us then - but when I put our names into a phone book recently, it came out about 190,000 approximately are regular members of SWA. I took a 'group conscience" about what they thought about this Bill - also being sure I talked to members who had specifically been trafficked in Nevada.
They all hated her Bill and felt it was harmful to us. So I wrote her office asking to speak with her on behalf of our members. I got nowhere. The best I could do was I asked to be on her mailing list of when the hearings were going to be on the Bill. Her assistant told me I was "on the mailing list". Only I'm opening up the paper and seeing they've just had a meeting - only I got nothing in the email about it.
Now to get victims of Nevada trafficking to safety - we have to get them out of Nevada. So I can't just have someone "pop over" to a meeting when I see it's going on. I need time to arrange to bring them in to speak. So I take note of the events around town that are showing films, and having lectures, and other events where "one can meet and speak to a trafficking victim". Only these people won't let me know either.
Like the Dream Center in Las Vegas. They were holding a lot of events about the bill. Only I'm not being told when these events are. I'm emailing and leaving messages and sending faxes - and I can't get Aaron on the phone, nor will anyone tell me anything. I knew people in his church. So I asked them "can you please ask him to return my calls?" One man comes back and says "he said he's just been busy but he will". Then a woman comes back saying "he said he's had a cold - but he will". Then a third person said "he's been meaning to call you but been busy - but he will". So after a month, and a bunch of excuses being handed out - it's very clear to me that Aaron, the head pastor of the Dream Center in Las Vegas is not going to call me back.
Why? Because he's raising up donations that's why and clearly doesn't want a little thing like listening to anyone working with trafficking victims in Nevada to be mucking anything up. I mean he's got a fund raiser to put on. So I offer up some real life true Nevada victims of TRAFFICKING to speak because all I'm seeing are junkie street walking prostitutes and street pimps talking - not TRAFFICKING victims. Or victims from other countries. What I'm NOT hearing are about Nevada TRAFFICKING victims.
When I'm calling Catherine's office about why I'm not getting invites to the events she's speaking at - her assistant just keeps handing me one excuse after the other after the other. I heard "I just bought a new computer" and I "just moved offices" and "my kids have been sick" and for WEEKS I'm hearing nothing but excuses about why I'm not getting a list of these events sent to me by anyone. Finally, I threatened to write about it on social media. Guess what? She sends me an email claiming that "we're not working on any human trafficking bills". I have a copy of that email elsewhere in this blog.
While this is going on - the site for the Attorney General has listed "resources" for victims to call for help. Only the resources she listed are NO resources. First, she listed the National Trafficking Hotline. Okay - they'll take a report. Then they will give them a list of numbers to programs that won't provide transportation. To date, about 90 percent of every person who has called me for help in Nevada is without money or wheels. The Salvation Army program is 800 miles from brothels and strip clubs in Carson City, Reno, Mound, etc. Partnership for Homeless Youth is not going to be of any help to a 24 year old stripper or prostitute in a Nevada brothel.
I"m going to point you to Christy Mack. Not as a trafficking victim but as a member of the sex industry. Now - let's say a trafficker got ahold of her and started threatening to kill her other if she didn't start turning over her money to them. Now - I ask you - is she going to go to the Partnership for Homeless Youth for help or the Shade Tree homeless shelter? She owns her own home for God's sake! She's also over 18 years of age.
So I increase my attempts to get ahold of Ms. Masto to let her know that not only does her bill in our opinion HARM victims, but that her list of resources she's posted in no way, shape, or form HELPS us. It doesn't help anyone. She's listed Immigration on the list. I'm going to call up Immigration and say what? I want to get away from traffickers at a strip club in Las Vegas? Give me a break!
The letters about her resource list are also ignored.
I then have survivors of Nevada trafficking who want to testify but they are safely outside of Nevada. So I asked everyone I could at the legislature if arrangements could be made to take testimony by phone or skype - they refused. They said they HAD to be on the floor and FILMED to be heard. Now can they come "anonymously"? NO. They have to sign in, state their legal name, and then be filmed full face on camera to be heard.
Well I'm not going to get many willing to do that. So I wrote up a letter on behalf of those victims. I sent them out a copy of the letter for input to make sure it reflected the general view and consensus of the Nevada trafficking victims. I got the letter back, and then sent a copy to Catherine. She did not respond.
So Aubrey agreed to go to the legislature on a hearing date and not only personally hand a copy of this letter to everyone on the floor, but to also READ the letter into the transcript of the hearing. Now this hearing was taking place in Carson City. I was living in Las Vegas at the time. Our outreach RV had been stolen, then returned. It then broke down a few blocks down the road. I took the RV to Findley RV. Their mechanic came back and told me it had been rigged with a bomb set to blow after 45 minutes of driving - so my life was saved by the breakdown. But this leaves me without a car.
I heard 45 "abolitionists" were going to get a bus to go testify and I asked to get on that bus. Everyone ignored me. I asked John Hambrick if he would take me up to the hearing with him. He said he was not driving. Okay still will you take me with you? He refused. I knew others who were driving up from different churches and asked them if they would take me. They were then supposedly told anyone who helped me "would be shunned from the church". I didn't have money to fly to Carson City, nor take a bus. I'm living on $720 a month in disability money mind you. I have no grant, no salary, no fund raisers. Aubrey is also living on $720 and raising two kids - so she doesn't have money to fly me up to Carson City either.
That left us with the only representative we had that day to walk into that floor with Aubrey was another SWA member. One who was filming her with a phone camera. So she read the letter to the Nevada legislature. Aubrey also said she saw Catherine Masto-Cortez take a check for $17,000 from Dennis Hof, the owner of the Bunny Ranch. She also said when they saw she saw it - they tucked the check away fast.
After the letter was read, and a copy was given to everyone including Catherine, Aubrey says Catherine refused to acknowledge her, look at her in the eye, thank her, nothing. It was a cold icey response she said she got from everyone. She said people wouldn't even sit with her while she was waiting to testify. After the hearing - she says she went up to Catherine and John Hambrick and put them on the spot about what WE wanted to see done to help US. They told her "yes we will look into this" and then promptly moved away from her.
John Hambrick and Catherine DID NOT appear at the "off the books" hearing to expand the brothels into Las Vegas by the way either.
I also know that Polaris came to Nevada to try and get the same sign law passed that passed in California to require posting of a sign with the National Trafficking Hotline into every location where sex work is happening. It passed in California - but not in Nevada. I think it's even more needed in Nevada BECAUSE THE LEGAL AGE IS 15 YEARS OLD. Meaning yes we have 16 year old girls working in strip clubs and brothels in Nevada who don't even have a drivers' license, and aren't old enough to even VOTE.
In the brothels, they have to live there for weeks at a time. If they are caught reading - they are fined. So they NEED A SIGN with the hotline number placed in the brothels. Now does the check she received have anything to do with there not being a sign law? Don't know. Does the fact there's no signs have anything to do with Lance Gilman owning a brothel AND being a councilman? No idea. So I'm wondering why I'm hearing that Polaris had sent in a representative to talk to the Attorney General about this Bill AND about getting the signs posted in sex businesses - and I then see that it got approved in California, but NOT Nevada? Okay that means that Catherine had to approve that.
Now was she happy that I was the only person/group protesting AB67 besides SWOP? When I saw us losing ground on AB67 I called up Jennifer Reed with SWOP> I made her an offer (before the RV had a bomb put in it). The offer was to take the RV on a protest run across the state of Nevada like the old days. I wanted to put a banner on the RV and go around handing out flyers about why Nevada should NOT vote for AB67. I can't drive the RV and hand out flyers - so I wanted to partner with SWOP to get some people to get involved and help.
Her response? First she said if she so much as even met me for coffee, or let me interview her for www.leavingtheliferadio.com that "Norma Jeane Almodavor will have my head". So evidently because she didn't want to piss off Norma or stand up to her mouth - she wasn't going to partner with us. The second reason was because she had been told by "someone in the legislature that IF she did quote not work with Jody that they would see to it that AB67 was defeated". Now I told Jennifer that I'd seen those tactics before and not to believe them. All that was for was to get her to not partner with me and to shut up until it was too late. Then it would be "so sue me" over not honoring a back door promise? Come on! But she evidently bought it. She even bought it when Congo Justice supposedly told her that we had spoken FOR AB67 when we specifically did not. I even showed her the letter we'd read where we stated all the reasons why we were against it.
But back to Catherine. She clearly wasn't happy about our work trying to undermine AB67 and to defeat the brothel's push to expand into Vegas that we won that round because the next thing I know I'm getting a letter from the Nevada Secretary of State. He's claiming that someone had contacted him about us holding a fund raiser without being a 501c3 or an actual business entity. I told him I wasn't and demanded proof. He then shows me a website that someone else had put up that did appear to be us - but it in fact was not. To prove it - I told him to hit the Paypal button and he'd see that money was going to someone that was not me, wasn't a partner of ours, and I further showed him a letter I'd sent this person months before stating I wanted nothing to do with her and breaking all formal ties. To this he had to acknowledge that this site was not me holding a fund raiser.
That should have been the end of it. But I asked him who even brought this to his attention. I mean they're not sitting around every day looking for my fund raisers. So what prompted this whole thing? He then announces that despite the fact it's not me raising the money that I'm STILL "operating a business without a license" and therefore he's going to seek six months in jail for operating a business without a license".
I'm floored. I'm like "can you repeat that please?" He says that he's "spoken to the Attorney General and they are prepared to put together a case asking for six months in jail for operating a business without a license". Okay I tell him - there's one problem with your premise here and that's to operate a "business" I have to be charging for something which I'm not. I have not held a fund raiser. I have not applied for a grant. I have not solicited money. I give away our books. I don't pass the basket at our meetings. I don't charge for my time or advice or consult - so where am I operating a business?"
He says "you offer your book for sale". I said "okay you want to see my bank statements because I'm not selling any". I then showed him the business code that said for a business to be considered a "business" and not a "hobby" that one has to earn either more than $10,000 from it or 2/3 of their income has to come from it. Neither of which is the case for me. HE'S STILL NOT BACKING DOWN.
This guy is seriously threatening me with jail! The fact I'm not operating a business doesn't seem to deter him from telling me they're going to have me locked up for six months and that the Attorney General is pushing for this! So great - here am I trying to help these women and not making a dime for it and I'm going to jail?
How did I back him down? Nevada is a one party consent state. Meaning I don't need his consent to record him and publish those phone calls on social media. I threatened to post the calls and emails on social media while they're pushing this bill through IF he didn't back off. He stuttered and sputtered a bit and did his postering of course - but he finally backed off.
So not only has Catherine now not involved me in any way with this trafficking bill AB67 - but now she's sic'd the Secretary of State after me to try and throw me in JAIL! This is our "voice of the people" here who cares so much about trafficking victims that she's trying to have the founder of the movement, a survivor, and the director of Sex Workers Anonymous THROWN INTO JAIL for the work I've done in Nevada on behalf of other victims.
No - all I see she's doing is what I've seen them all do who have been using sex trafficking as a platform to get campaign money and votes and advance their careers on the backs of a movement I devoted MY LIFE to get into being even real - they are the "hijackers" that Michael Horowitz and I are trying to shout out about to you as voters.
You the voters are the line that can stop this. What is going on right now is NO DIFFERENT than when Pablo Escobar got himself into office to protect his interests in Mexico or when the drug cartel took control of the Colombian government. What we are seeing is THE SAME.
I am not alone in feeling she is not doing her job to protect us - the people. https://nevadastatepersonnelwatch.wordpress.com/tag/nevada-attorney-general-catherine-cortez-masto-and-governor-brian-sandoval-protest/
http://nevadapac.ning.com/profiles/blogs/nevada-anti-corruption-movement-protests-corruption-by-nv-ag
There are other links you can find online talking about her corruption. The people who are being harmed right now are mostly girls between the ages of 15 and 18 years of age. They CAN'T VOTE. Some of the victims have felony records and also can't vote. Records that's going to take years to expunge.
YOU CAN. Don't let this woman advance any further over our backs PLEASE. DO NOT VOTE FOR CATHERINE MASTO-CORTEZ.
Back to my blog post:
Since I'm talking about my experiences with the candidates right now - my daughter read me a campaign email she got about Kamala Harris and Catherine Masto-Cortez. Why am I not surprised they're lumped together? Well I wrote about my experience, or lack of experience I should say, with Kamala here http://traffickingandprostitutionservices.blogspot.com/2015/09/kamala-harris.html and I wrote about David Vitter here http://traffickingandprostitutionservices.blogspot.com/2015/09/david-vitter.html and John Hambrick here - http://traffickingandprostitutionservices.blogspot.com/2015/09/letter-i-wrote-today-to-office-of.html
As I'm looking at their campaigns - I see the same note running through it. That of "family values". Let me first cite my experience a moment with the people who are backing these candidates. I'm going to cite the lawsuit of the ACLU vs. the Catholic Bishops. https://www.aclu.org/blog/first-circuit-court-should-defend-victims-human-trafficking and also the Supreme Court case that had to be fought over the lives, and bodies, of women in this country. http://www.scotusblog.com/case-files/cases/agency-for-international-development-v-alliance-for-open-society-international-inc/
BACKGROUND
I'm also going to show you a letter I wrote to the Catholic Church and the Salvation Army (no I haven't got a response back yet). http://traffickingandprostitutionservices.blogspot.com/2015/09/letter-to-catholic-bishops-and.html
When I started the movement for sex trafficking victims to get help in this country - it was with this in mind. First, the sex industry is just that - an industry. It's an industry no different than farming, manufacturing, hospitality, fishing, etc. Other industries like these sometimes have trafficking victims forced to work in those industries.
I am not saying this as a moral statement - just a fact. If you look at the porn industry alone - it employs a lot of people. You have the performers yes. But you also have the photographers, the editors, the sound people, the graphic designers, and then comes the marketing people. Take one look at the AVN Awards and you will see how big the porn industry is. In the 1980's - I'd be willing to bet just about every man on this planet knew who Linda Lovelace and Marilyn Chambers were.
Look at the strip club industry that's a part of the sex industry. You have dancers yes. So while these church teams are out trying to tell the dancers that "Jesus loves them" - there's also the bartenders, the waitresses, the DJ's, the doormen, the bouncers, etc. They have bookkeepers, and they buy alcohol for the bar, and food for the snacks, and they hire cooks and cleaning crews. They buy light systems and sound systems and even hire interior designers to design the look of their clubs. They buy signs and office supplies and pay taxes.
Now take a look at Mally Mall who had his house recently raided - and now tell me this is not an "industry". The man is on a show on Vh1. He has a record company, as well he runs an outcall service in Las Vegas. He makes enough money to live in a million dollar home, buy exotic animals, and guess what? He employs, and works with a lot of people. He's not only part of the record industry - but also the sex industry which often overlaps. Look at Snoop Dogg's confession he was pimping at the same time he was touring in his Rolling Stone confession.
So stop looking at this as a MORAL issue. You want to get MORAL on me? A lot of people have died from alcoholism. Yet the alcohol industry is alive and well and an INDUSTRY. Do I have relatives who DIED from alcohol? Yes. What about the tobacco industry? My mother smoked four packs a day of cigarettes until she died because her lungs were like paper the doctors told me. So tobacco killed my mother. Do I agree with tobacco? No I don't smoke. But it's STILL AN INDUSTRY.
Now you don't AGREE with the sex industry - power to you. The FACT remains it's an INDUSTRY. An industry that within it sometimes trafficks people. If you look at the DEA owned strip club in NJ - those dancers were illegals and they were being trafficked in that club. How? They had family back in Colombia. Family that if they stepped out of line - the drug cartel owned police would have done something to their family before they could even get on a plane here in the states. The DEA guys who owned that club were a stone's throw supposedly to the White House. They supposedly made jokes about "inviting Obama and the Secret Service down to the club". It was reported that many people in law enforcement and politics went to that club. A club where those women could no more go to a Salvation Army or a Catholic Charities shelter for safe haven than fly.
That's my issue. First of all, street prostitutes, street pimps, junkies - that's not sex trafficking. Is that force? Yes. But it's more of a drug addiction and domestic violence issue than it is sex trafficking. Nor is it about the sex industry. There are strip clubs operating right now where the women dancing there are not being forced to dance there, nor is their money being taken from them for dancing at that club. There are "independent operators" in the sex industry that are there by choice, and it's their career, and no one is forcing them to do or say anything.
So number one. I'm not trying to stamp out the sex industry anymore than I'm going to try and bring back prohibition nor am I trying to get tobacco companies shut down. I don't drink and I don't smoke. Period.
But no one is forcing someone to drink or smoke either that I'm aware of. Now we have a different story. When men, women and children, are being sold like cattle as sex slaves to trafficking rings and/or private owners - we have a problem. We have a problem in that they can't "just say no" number one. Number two, back in the 1970's and 1980's when I first came into the sex industry - I saw no way out for these victims.
Yes I saw shelters for street prostitutes. I saw drug treatment centers for street prostitutes. I saw church outreach programs like the Mary Magdalene Project to get street prostitutes off the streets. However, what I DID NOT SEE was help for sex trafficking victims because we were not recognized as REAL. Meaning if you called the police for help - you would be arrested or ignored. If you went to a counselor for help - you would either be locked up as hallucinating, or they would simply ignore you. One of the other. We were either treated like criminals, deviants, or ignored.
Now how do we change this? We can't change the system until people believe the issue was real. So we embarked upon a media campaign of talk shows, news shows, interviews, public speaking, shows like 60 Minutes, etc. By 1994 when I moved to Nebraska - I couldn't walk into a gas station or a coffee shop without someone saying 'hey aren't you that Prostitutes Anonymous lady?" Yes I was.
So that led to the Trafficking Act of 2000. Great now we had federal recognition. But that also meant FEDERAL MONEY. Now back when HIV was raging - the jails wanted rid of us. So they handed me prostitutes on a silver plate. Here - get them out of the jails and into your residential programs because our guards don't want to work with them. We got the first home for male prostitutes put together in Los Angeles actually. Then we got one for transgenders because they were having them sleep in the cafeteria because they couldn't put them in the dorms.
Okay now HIV is receding. Guess what? Now we have a system that wants to BUILD bigger newer jails. They want to incarcerate anyone they can get their hands on. Want an easy way to do that? Simply grab a street walker, offer her a choice - say you're a trafficking victim and go into these faith based programs or GO TO JAIL. The jails are filling up - and now they get to build those bigger newer jails. Problem solved for THEM but what about us?
Now I moved to Nevada in 1996 because I'm getting phone calls from victims of sex trafficking who are within the legal brothels of Nevada telling me they CAN'T GET OUT. They are stuck in brothels in tiny little towns that have no cab system, no bus system, no limo system, and they're not old enough to drive, and the police are on the brothel owners' payroll, and the law says they can't walk out of there on their own two feet and hitch out of there - so to get away from their pimp they have to have someone who is going to physically drive a car up to them and get them out of there. Before I made the extreme measure of shutting down my business, closing down my radio show I was producing with very high ratings, and selling off my real estate, and moving my husband and daughter to Nevada - yes I tried to call the police to see if they would help these women. I got nothing.
Why? Because to arrest someone for TRAFFICKING requires an investigation. It requires evidence. It requires paperwork. However, to arrest someone for PROSTITUTION is easy. Even arresting for pimping is easy. You arrest a street prostitute easy. You've seen the stings on TV. Then she says "that's my pimp" and you got an arrest. Easy peesy.
However, to get an arrest for TRAFFICKING is much more complicated. Now with the federal recognition, money was yes going to shelters like the Salvation Army and the Catholic Charities. Who were able to house women while they were prosecuting a case. That's how the government was paying for them to stay.
But then the Catholic Bishops came in and said "well pay for the case management of any woman you put in here who is a prostitute on certain conditions". One of those conditions was huge. It tied into the 2003 TVRA Act. What this meant was that they could not "partner with, associate with, or refer to" anyone who did not have a "written policy against prostitution".
Now this is a whole other story. What this means is this - imagine if you were an alcoholic treatment program. Now imagine that you can only refer the alcoholics in your program to people who were pushing for prohibition. Think about it. You can't let them go to an AA meeting, or read an AA Big Book, or even talk to Bill Wilson. Why? Because Bill Wilson is not on a team that is pushing to outlaw alcohol. If anything, AA can not "express an opinion about an outside issue".
So guess what? In 2004, we were booted out of every single Salvation Army, every Catholic Charity funded program, and the victims were blocked from even speaking to us. The staff was blocked from speaking to us. Why? Not because we were ineffective. In fact, I can show you independent research that even validates we were effective. But because we were not calling to OUTLAW pornography and prostitution.
In fact, by stating that trafficking was a PART of the sex industry, and not the industry as a WHOLE - we were further shunned from the very movement we had created. Now I'm sorry but I can't act out a scene from "Taming of the Shrew" and say the sky is green and the moon is out at noon just because these people are saying it is. Sex work is an industry and no not all workers are victims. Also, as 12 step group no I can not join in the fight against the industry itself because then I lose the very people I'm trying to help AND who is helping me to do that.
Because where on earth do you think our referrals are coming from? Where do alcoholics come from? The bars. Where do smokers come from? From buying tobacco. Where do addicts come from? Many times they come from doctors. So guess where we hear about where sex trafficking is operating? From people in the sex industry. Okay now if I go up against a strip club and try and shut down that club - why on earth would he call me in to help a woman he sees being trafficked? Because they're on the front lines - I'm not. A sober alcoholic is not in the bars anymore. I'm not in the clubs anymore. I'm not in the sex industry anymore. So we rely upon referrals. People who trust we're going to help them and not bring in the cops on them.
So guess where that leaves me suddenly? You guessed it. I'm getting calls from victims needing help - and suddenly my calls aren't being returned from the people who are giving them housing, food donations, clothing donations. Because most of the time when these victims call me - they're running from the pimps and traffickers and have nothing. So from 1987 until 2004 - I've had an informal partnership with these charities. I've had to turn to them for help with getting these men and women housing, food, clothing, etc. To get them on their feet until we can get them working.
What do I do about it? No one will talk to me. So I look for legal action. No lawyer is going to sue on a case where he's not going to win money. So I started writing the ACLU. We win. Now they are court ordered by law to STOP isolating these victims and also ISOLATING from us. Because what was happening was the victims they got were being put in these houses where they were being refused licensed therapists (only allowed pastoral counselors) and also refused any medical visits except when they were pregnant, and then only with doctors who would not discuss birth control nor abortion, which in some cases meant no doctor at all.
Now the Supreme Court decision was not until June of 2013. But the ACLU lawsuit was in 2012. So what happens in February of 2013? These people are fighting for ground. Suddenly I'm seeing trafficking bills popping up all over the country. California, Nevada, Nebraska, Florida, etc. I don't have a paid staff. We don't get grants. This is work I do in my spare time. What do I do? I am taught to "work with what I got" and "do what's in front of you". So this means Nevada.
CATHERINE AND ME
I read the news that Catherine Masto-Cortez has created a trafficking bill and there's going to be hearings on this. Okay great. I write her office, introduce myself, and ask if I might be involved in some manner. I hear nothing back. You can read about AB67 here - http://ag.nv.gov/News/PR/2013/Human_Trafficking/Attorney_General_Masto%E2%80%99s_Sex_Trafficking_Legislation_Passed_by_Nevada_Legislature/
Now when I gave the press conference in 2007 about sex trafficking existing in Nevada even within the legal sex industry - Catherine never introduced herself to me, expressed any interest or support, etc. So we just gave a huge press conference that everyone everywhere across the world heard about - and she doesn't step up to show any interest in the subject, nor our work in Nevada.
But here she is now writing up a Bill to "help" us. Okay so I read the bill and I disagree with it that it's going to help us in any way. In fact, I believe it's going to be quite harmful to us. So I send out a copy of her proposed bill to our membership of Sex Workers Anonymous. I hadn't done a count of us then - but when I put our names into a phone book recently, it came out about 190,000 approximately are regular members of SWA. I took a 'group conscience" about what they thought about this Bill - also being sure I talked to members who had specifically been trafficked in Nevada.
They all hated her Bill and felt it was harmful to us. So I wrote her office asking to speak with her on behalf of our members. I got nowhere. The best I could do was I asked to be on her mailing list of when the hearings were going to be on the Bill. Her assistant told me I was "on the mailing list". Only I'm opening up the paper and seeing they've just had a meeting - only I got nothing in the email about it.
Now to get victims of Nevada trafficking to safety - we have to get them out of Nevada. So I can't just have someone "pop over" to a meeting when I see it's going on. I need time to arrange to bring them in to speak. So I take note of the events around town that are showing films, and having lectures, and other events where "one can meet and speak to a trafficking victim". Only these people won't let me know either.
Like the Dream Center in Las Vegas. They were holding a lot of events about the bill. Only I'm not being told when these events are. I'm emailing and leaving messages and sending faxes - and I can't get Aaron on the phone, nor will anyone tell me anything. I knew people in his church. So I asked them "can you please ask him to return my calls?" One man comes back and says "he said he's just been busy but he will". Then a woman comes back saying "he said he's had a cold - but he will". Then a third person said "he's been meaning to call you but been busy - but he will". So after a month, and a bunch of excuses being handed out - it's very clear to me that Aaron, the head pastor of the Dream Center in Las Vegas is not going to call me back.
Why? Because he's raising up donations that's why and clearly doesn't want a little thing like listening to anyone working with trafficking victims in Nevada to be mucking anything up. I mean he's got a fund raiser to put on. So I offer up some real life true Nevada victims of TRAFFICKING to speak because all I'm seeing are junkie street walking prostitutes and street pimps talking - not TRAFFICKING victims. Or victims from other countries. What I'm NOT hearing are about Nevada TRAFFICKING victims.
When I'm calling Catherine's office about why I'm not getting invites to the events she's speaking at - her assistant just keeps handing me one excuse after the other after the other. I heard "I just bought a new computer" and I "just moved offices" and "my kids have been sick" and for WEEKS I'm hearing nothing but excuses about why I'm not getting a list of these events sent to me by anyone. Finally, I threatened to write about it on social media. Guess what? She sends me an email claiming that "we're not working on any human trafficking bills". I have a copy of that email elsewhere in this blog.
While this is going on - the site for the Attorney General has listed "resources" for victims to call for help. Only the resources she listed are NO resources. First, she listed the National Trafficking Hotline. Okay - they'll take a report. Then they will give them a list of numbers to programs that won't provide transportation. To date, about 90 percent of every person who has called me for help in Nevada is without money or wheels. The Salvation Army program is 800 miles from brothels and strip clubs in Carson City, Reno, Mound, etc. Partnership for Homeless Youth is not going to be of any help to a 24 year old stripper or prostitute in a Nevada brothel.
I"m going to point you to Christy Mack. Not as a trafficking victim but as a member of the sex industry. Now - let's say a trafficker got ahold of her and started threatening to kill her other if she didn't start turning over her money to them. Now - I ask you - is she going to go to the Partnership for Homeless Youth for help or the Shade Tree homeless shelter? She owns her own home for God's sake! She's also over 18 years of age.
So I increase my attempts to get ahold of Ms. Masto to let her know that not only does her bill in our opinion HARM victims, but that her list of resources she's posted in no way, shape, or form HELPS us. It doesn't help anyone. She's listed Immigration on the list. I'm going to call up Immigration and say what? I want to get away from traffickers at a strip club in Las Vegas? Give me a break!
The letters about her resource list are also ignored.
I then have survivors of Nevada trafficking who want to testify but they are safely outside of Nevada. So I asked everyone I could at the legislature if arrangements could be made to take testimony by phone or skype - they refused. They said they HAD to be on the floor and FILMED to be heard. Now can they come "anonymously"? NO. They have to sign in, state their legal name, and then be filmed full face on camera to be heard.
Well I'm not going to get many willing to do that. So I wrote up a letter on behalf of those victims. I sent them out a copy of the letter for input to make sure it reflected the general view and consensus of the Nevada trafficking victims. I got the letter back, and then sent a copy to Catherine. She did not respond.
So Aubrey agreed to go to the legislature on a hearing date and not only personally hand a copy of this letter to everyone on the floor, but to also READ the letter into the transcript of the hearing. Now this hearing was taking place in Carson City. I was living in Las Vegas at the time. Our outreach RV had been stolen, then returned. It then broke down a few blocks down the road. I took the RV to Findley RV. Their mechanic came back and told me it had been rigged with a bomb set to blow after 45 minutes of driving - so my life was saved by the breakdown. But this leaves me without a car.
I heard 45 "abolitionists" were going to get a bus to go testify and I asked to get on that bus. Everyone ignored me. I asked John Hambrick if he would take me up to the hearing with him. He said he was not driving. Okay still will you take me with you? He refused. I knew others who were driving up from different churches and asked them if they would take me. They were then supposedly told anyone who helped me "would be shunned from the church". I didn't have money to fly to Carson City, nor take a bus. I'm living on $720 a month in disability money mind you. I have no grant, no salary, no fund raisers. Aubrey is also living on $720 and raising two kids - so she doesn't have money to fly me up to Carson City either.
That left us with the only representative we had that day to walk into that floor with Aubrey was another SWA member. One who was filming her with a phone camera. So she read the letter to the Nevada legislature. Aubrey also said she saw Catherine Masto-Cortez take a check for $17,000 from Dennis Hof, the owner of the Bunny Ranch. She also said when they saw she saw it - they tucked the check away fast.
After the letter was read, and a copy was given to everyone including Catherine, Aubrey says Catherine refused to acknowledge her, look at her in the eye, thank her, nothing. It was a cold icey response she said she got from everyone. She said people wouldn't even sit with her while she was waiting to testify. After the hearing - she says she went up to Catherine and John Hambrick and put them on the spot about what WE wanted to see done to help US. They told her "yes we will look into this" and then promptly moved away from her.
John Hambrick and Catherine DID NOT appear at the "off the books" hearing to expand the brothels into Las Vegas by the way either.
I also know that Polaris came to Nevada to try and get the same sign law passed that passed in California to require posting of a sign with the National Trafficking Hotline into every location where sex work is happening. It passed in California - but not in Nevada. I think it's even more needed in Nevada BECAUSE THE LEGAL AGE IS 15 YEARS OLD. Meaning yes we have 16 year old girls working in strip clubs and brothels in Nevada who don't even have a drivers' license, and aren't old enough to even VOTE.
In the brothels, they have to live there for weeks at a time. If they are caught reading - they are fined. So they NEED A SIGN with the hotline number placed in the brothels. Now does the check she received have anything to do with there not being a sign law? Don't know. Does the fact there's no signs have anything to do with Lance Gilman owning a brothel AND being a councilman? No idea. So I'm wondering why I'm hearing that Polaris had sent in a representative to talk to the Attorney General about this Bill AND about getting the signs posted in sex businesses - and I then see that it got approved in California, but NOT Nevada? Okay that means that Catherine had to approve that.
Now was she happy that I was the only person/group protesting AB67 besides SWOP? When I saw us losing ground on AB67 I called up Jennifer Reed with SWOP> I made her an offer (before the RV had a bomb put in it). The offer was to take the RV on a protest run across the state of Nevada like the old days. I wanted to put a banner on the RV and go around handing out flyers about why Nevada should NOT vote for AB67. I can't drive the RV and hand out flyers - so I wanted to partner with SWOP to get some people to get involved and help.
Her response? First she said if she so much as even met me for coffee, or let me interview her for www.leavingtheliferadio.com that "Norma Jeane Almodavor will have my head". So evidently because she didn't want to piss off Norma or stand up to her mouth - she wasn't going to partner with us. The second reason was because she had been told by "someone in the legislature that IF she did quote not work with Jody that they would see to it that AB67 was defeated". Now I told Jennifer that I'd seen those tactics before and not to believe them. All that was for was to get her to not partner with me and to shut up until it was too late. Then it would be "so sue me" over not honoring a back door promise? Come on! But she evidently bought it. She even bought it when Congo Justice supposedly told her that we had spoken FOR AB67 when we specifically did not. I even showed her the letter we'd read where we stated all the reasons why we were against it.
But back to Catherine. She clearly wasn't happy about our work trying to undermine AB67 and to defeat the brothel's push to expand into Vegas that we won that round because the next thing I know I'm getting a letter from the Nevada Secretary of State. He's claiming that someone had contacted him about us holding a fund raiser without being a 501c3 or an actual business entity. I told him I wasn't and demanded proof. He then shows me a website that someone else had put up that did appear to be us - but it in fact was not. To prove it - I told him to hit the Paypal button and he'd see that money was going to someone that was not me, wasn't a partner of ours, and I further showed him a letter I'd sent this person months before stating I wanted nothing to do with her and breaking all formal ties. To this he had to acknowledge that this site was not me holding a fund raiser.
That should have been the end of it. But I asked him who even brought this to his attention. I mean they're not sitting around every day looking for my fund raisers. So what prompted this whole thing? He then announces that despite the fact it's not me raising the money that I'm STILL "operating a business without a license" and therefore he's going to seek six months in jail for operating a business without a license".
I'm floored. I'm like "can you repeat that please?" He says that he's "spoken to the Attorney General and they are prepared to put together a case asking for six months in jail for operating a business without a license". Okay I tell him - there's one problem with your premise here and that's to operate a "business" I have to be charging for something which I'm not. I have not held a fund raiser. I have not applied for a grant. I have not solicited money. I give away our books. I don't pass the basket at our meetings. I don't charge for my time or advice or consult - so where am I operating a business?"
He says "you offer your book for sale". I said "okay you want to see my bank statements because I'm not selling any". I then showed him the business code that said for a business to be considered a "business" and not a "hobby" that one has to earn either more than $10,000 from it or 2/3 of their income has to come from it. Neither of which is the case for me. HE'S STILL NOT BACKING DOWN.
This guy is seriously threatening me with jail! The fact I'm not operating a business doesn't seem to deter him from telling me they're going to have me locked up for six months and that the Attorney General is pushing for this! So great - here am I trying to help these women and not making a dime for it and I'm going to jail?
How did I back him down? Nevada is a one party consent state. Meaning I don't need his consent to record him and publish those phone calls on social media. I threatened to post the calls and emails on social media while they're pushing this bill through IF he didn't back off. He stuttered and sputtered a bit and did his postering of course - but he finally backed off.
So not only has Catherine now not involved me in any way with this trafficking bill AB67 - but now she's sic'd the Secretary of State after me to try and throw me in JAIL! This is our "voice of the people" here who cares so much about trafficking victims that she's trying to have the founder of the movement, a survivor, and the director of Sex Workers Anonymous THROWN INTO JAIL for the work I've done in Nevada on behalf of other victims.
No - all I see she's doing is what I've seen them all do who have been using sex trafficking as a platform to get campaign money and votes and advance their careers on the backs of a movement I devoted MY LIFE to get into being even real - they are the "hijackers" that Michael Horowitz and I are trying to shout out about to you as voters.
You the voters are the line that can stop this. What is going on right now is NO DIFFERENT than when Pablo Escobar got himself into office to protect his interests in Mexico or when the drug cartel took control of the Colombian government. What we are seeing is THE SAME.
I am not alone in feeling she is not doing her job to protect us - the people. https://nevadastatepersonnelwatch.wordpress.com/tag/nevada-attorney-general-catherine-cortez-masto-and-governor-brian-sandoval-protest/
http://nevadapac.ning.com/profiles/blogs/nevada-anti-corruption-movement-protests-corruption-by-nv-ag
There are other links you can find online talking about her corruption. The people who are being harmed right now are mostly girls between the ages of 15 and 18 years of age. They CAN'T VOTE. Some of the victims have felony records and also can't vote. Records that's going to take years to expunge.
YOU CAN. Don't let this woman advance any further over our backs PLEASE. DO NOT VOTE FOR CATHERINE MASTO-CORTEZ.
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