TRUCKERS AGAINST TRAFFICKING

I started helping women wanting to escape the legal brothels of Nevada in 1988.  Back then it was to get away from Joe Conforte, who was the owner of the Mustang Ranch at first.  When the Shady Lady opened up - it was owned by the Hell's Angel's.

So the women wanted away from them, their pimps, or the tricks who would know they could rape these women without them calling the cops.  So guys who liked to rape women violently were being allowed to come there and do what they wanted according to what I heard knowing they wouldn't be able to call the cops about him.

Heck, one told me it was a cop who was raping her when working there!  The guy who was the cop who was supposed to pick up the HIV/AIDS test results weekly she told me was allowed to do what he wnated with the women in exchange for not taking in the test kit.   You can hear her tell the story of what she went through there here - www.blogtalkradio.com/stopsextrafficktalk/2013/07/08/hear-from-a-nevada-brothel-prostitute  She's the woman who testified at the hearing about expanding brothels into downtown Las Vegas where the Mob Museum now stands instead of a brothel - and won.

The brothels tried to keep the hearing off the calendar so no one would show up to oppose them - but we have a lot of friends in high places who told us of what was going on.  In fact we got the call "you better get someone down here fast" and she was the closest one who had come out of there who wanted to testify.

Others report their pimps are allowed to push them into working when they don't want to.  They are not given their own money - with it going to their "manager".  That way they can't take their own money and leave.  You ever wonder why they don't "just leave"?  How would you like someone to have all your money, and then not have a car, be out in the middle of nowhere, in a town so small there's no cab or limo company that will come out to pick you up and get you out of there.  I mean if there was cabs - I could just order one to go and pick them up.  But the nearest cab is an hour away - and that's only one brothel.  The others are hours from the nearest cab.

They can't walk out either.  The rules are pretty much after 9 pm a brothel prostitute can't be on the streets.  The law was made supposedly because housewives didn't want to worry about their husbands being tempted when these women were off-duty.  Please!    Also, you can't leave the brothel within the first 24 hours of your shift.  The reason is because they're waiting on your HIV results to come back before you leave.   Also, you can't leave within 48 hours of coming on your first shift.

Meaning, if you're walking down the street at 10 pm trying to get out of the brothels and away from them - you can have a cop come and threaten to arrest you if you don't go back with him to the brothel.

There used to be a Greyhound bus that would go from one end of the state to the other.  I used to have the women have a client take them to the bus stop, and then from there I had them come to me, or wherever they wanted to go.  If they wanted treatment - we would get them treatment.   If they were under 18 years of age - they could go to any airport or bus station and www.childrenofthenight.org would fly or bus them to their residential program in California.  When I had put together safe house in Nebraska - I used to have them take the bus right to me from Nevada.  If they wanted a more formal program there was the Mary Magdalene Project in Los Angeles or the Dignity Project in Phoenix.

When we got Sharnel Silvey connected up into this recovery movement - she set up the first alternative sentencing program in Nevada out of Reno.   She would go into the brothels with roses and talking Bible which would chase away the owners.  Then she'd leave the hotline # in the roses with them if they wanted out.  When they would leave the brothel but continue hooking in Reno or Carson City - they'd get busted.  So she set up the alternative sentencing program for them there.  The plan was to do it for two years and then expand into Clark County (Las Vegas).

But we needed housing.  Housing with no money and nothing but the clothes on their backs when they'd leave.  Also, we needed it where they didn't own the local cops.  Tonopah was a blessing for us in they only had a few cops who were really cool and nice to us.   A man there owned the local motel, apartment buildings, a casino, laundromat, thrift store, even a car lot.  So we could bring them into the motel at 2:00 a.m.  Then get the voucher to move them into the apartment on Monday, along with a voucher for furniture and clothing.   From there he'd give them a job and take payments on a car.  After about a year - they'd be ready to move on to another state on their own.

The problem was when Joe learned they were hoping on the bus - suddenly Greyhound discontinued their route from one end of the state to the other.  So Sharnel was on the northern end.  I was on the Vegas end.  The housing and jobs were in Tonopah which is the middle of the state.  These women weren't able to leave with a car or money.   So how do we get them from one end to the other?

Thanks to truck drivers.  I would get onto the CB and I made friends with some great drivers.  A couple of them had regular routes where that's all they did was go from one end of the state to the other and back.  So we could pretty much tell these women to get to a certain gas station and hop on with so and so and they'd get to where they needed to go.  These men were angels.  They fed these women, kept them safe, and never touched them inappropriately.    Some would even pretend to be their "john" and then take them out on an "outdate" to get them out of the brothel.   These truck drivers were our angels.

When Truckers Against Trafficking formed - I thought what a great idea to harness more of these wonderful men to maybe organize more than I was doing.  Because I would sometimes need to get a woman from say Florida into Los Angeles, or Canada, and I could get into the CB and usually find someone willing to do this heroic act for these women.  But I was just one person.  I could imagine if this was harnessed nationally what a great idea.

When they first launched TAT's, I spoke to their founder.  I told her what we had been doing.  She didn't want to hear it.  She started in with "all that could go wrong" and all the laws this was violating, and how these men could be fired, etc.  I told her these were grown men capable of making their own decisions and if they wanted to risk their jobs to save these women that was their decision.  Then she started in with how these men might rape the women in the cab and I got offended.  I'd never heard back from one of these women of a trucker ever being inappropriate.  I also explained to her I knew these men and I always had a photo of their truck, their ID, their plates, and that if a woman did disappear I knew who they were with and there would be no point because the drivers knew I knew all this information and I was usually on the phone with the woman off and on during the ride anyway.

She didn't want to hear it.  She sounded completely disgusted with me and never spoke to me after that initial phone call.

Since then I've heard from many a member of TATS.  They'd told me they're trained to call the National Trafficking Hotline when they see a woman in trouble.   When they call the hotline - they say to call the local police or trafficking task force.  Each trafficking task force in the USA is headed by the local police so it's the same thing if the task force is the police - it's the same thing.

When they say they've called the task force or police - the victim runs.  Well I know why.  She might have a warrant.  She might have been raped by this cop. http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-lapd-officers-sexual-assault-20160217-story.html    This cop might even be her pimp.  http://nypost.com/2016/02/02/nypd-cop-ran-tri-state-prostitution-ring-officials-say/   He could be a "john" of hers.  http://tucson.com/news/local/crime/tucson-police-employees-fired-over-prostitution-probe/article_c5844708-e3bc-5275-af3a-401aeb4d9676.html  He could be on the pimp's payroll.  Who knows but most women if they wanted to see a cop would call a cop themselves.  http://patch.com/california/sanramon/private-investigator-christopher-butler-pleads-guilty0df4c86437

So the drivers say the women have just run out of the truck and of course now none of the working girls will go near them again because "he called the cops".

I have spoken to some of the members of TATS now who tell me they have been FULLY advised of the legal risks they're taking putting an unauthorized passenger in their cabs.  Needless to say when I have asked them to help me get a victim from point a to point b - they really have to think twice about it and it now takes me at least 10 times more calls to find a "yes" now.

Here's what I want you all to know - if a woman gets out of a legal brothel in Nevada and to a gas station where she asks a trucker to take her to safety, and if that trucker calls the National Trafficking Hotline, who then advises him to call the local police/task force - here's what's going to happen:

If it's after 9 pm in most parts of Nevada - they will tell the woman she has to go back to the brothel or be arrested because of the curfew laws.

If it's within 24-48 hours of her coming onto the shift in most parts of Nevada - they will tell her if she doesn't come back with them to the brothel they will arrest her under the law pertaining to the HIV test incubation period.

Just FYI.

Oh, one other thing - girls 16 to 18 years of age are getting work permits to work in the restaurant section of the brothel which is in the same building as the brothel.   There are also some strip clubs who agree not to serve alcohol in the stage area of the strip club where there are 16 year old girls stripping in Nevada.  I get mixed answers about whether it's legal or not but I know this - I have picked up 16 year old girls as they've finished a shift in the strip club coming out of there with nothing on them but a backpack and some $1.00's so they are working in the strip clubs at 16 years of age.  We've then got them into treatment at places we know offering free treatment because each one of those girls has been on drugs we've picked up the pimp/dealer got them hooked on.  Two of those girls were pregnant with the pimp's baby.  Which by the way means they can't not tell him where they live with the baby or be charged with kidnapping.

Just so you know - there is no way around this other than to prove abuse of the child which by then is too late.  Every state in the USA will extradite also for child custody issues - which is why we recommend Canada as they don't.

Anyway, meaning if a trucker calls the police on a woman running out of the legal brothels of Nevada there's a good chance she'll be taken right back or arrested for leaving.

Are they aware of this?  Well that's what they get when they hire someone like Beth Jacobs as one of their training instructors.  I'll go into her more on another post as to her qualifications.

Okay I'll give you a hint - she was the person claiming to be a social worker when seeing trafficking victims who were in Project Rose.  You remember them?  http://www.vice.com/read/in-arizona-project-rose-is-arresting-sex-workers-to-save-them  They're the ones who threatened to arrest women they caught walking down the street with jail if they didn't attend the classes they gave in Phoenix, Arizona.  Only she wasn't a licensed social worker.  Yes I have screen shots of her being online representing to be a "social worker" in the active licensed sense.  Here's what the state board has to say about her status however - http://azbbhe.us/ProDetail.asp?ProfID=30945  She holds no license either in counseling, drug abuse or marriage and family counseling in Arizona.

Beth said in a fund raiser that she couldn't get her license because of "her felony record" because of being a trafficking victim.   However, when I called the licensing board (and recorded the call if you'd like to hear their answer), they claimed it was because of "psychiatric hospital admissions within the last five years".

Too bad Beth doesn't like to avail herself of any of the things we offer our members which include expunging records for free without having to come up with $1,000's of dollars for an attorney to help out (at least so far).  We've been able to package the evidence along with the motion to show the court how these people have changed since the arrest (because trying to prove trafficking would mean if you had proof you wouldn't have the charge in the first place), and how the record is limiting them and we've had the courts be wonderful about understanding our members not being able to afford an attorney for something they need so they can make more money.   Meaning walking in court with an expensive attorney doesn't really demonstrate how badly they need their records expunged.   Anyway, I offered this to Beth anyway when I heard but she refused to speak to me as usual.

Now am I saying that this means she's not a good trainer for TATS being that she's a survivor and survivors have issues like this routinely?  Not at all.  But when they hire someone who has a history of going online and CLAIMING to be a licensed social worker and REPRESENTING they are one to their clients and the public - then I'm pointing to the quality of their hiring choices.

Below is the list of resources the hotline lists for Nevada.  Hookers for Jesus is a residential program for one year that I was told last week is full.  The Salvation Army Seeds Program refers the women to a domestic violence shelter.  They do not offer transportation. Meaning you have to get to Las Vegas to use their services.  The other programs seem to be in California and Arizona and do not offer transportation.  I find it strange that Children of the Night is not listed since they offer not only a hotline for teens to call who want to get out of prostitution for any reason, but they also offer free transportation.  Meaning they can get to any cab, bus station or airport and they will transport them.  They are trained also in how to get the boy or girl away from the pimp who may be present at the time of the call.   As for "Awaken" in Reno, I've seen their constant fund raisers and outreach trainings they charge for to attend - but I've yet to see an outreach project, or any "rescues".  They refused to return Aubrey's call.  When I called them about Aubrey they did call her and offer free counseling.  However, they never then followed up and called her back with any counseling.  I have called them since to help me with other clients in northern Nevada only to never receive an answer. I have called asking them to help me with outreach in northern Nevada - and have never received an answer.

As for everyone else on the list - they're not even in Nevada and to my knowledge do not provide transportation to them in California or Arizona.  Our program appears to be the only one on the list that can be called 24/7 and will go and pick them up, take them where they need to go, and providing 12 step centered ongoing program of recovery no matter what state or country they wind up going to once leaving.

So in my opinion asking them to "call the task force" in Nevada won't work since there isn't one now to my knowledge.  I was told there was going to be a meeting in October, but then it was postponed.  I have not heard of a new date yet.  I've asked for the new head of the task force to please contact me last October of 2015 and have not received an answer from anyone yet.

To my knowledge, the founder of Truckers Against Trafficking http://www.truckersagainsttrafficking.org/  is not a survivor, nor has any experience with rescues I'm aware of.   While I appreciate their work raising awareness of trafficking to truckers - I have to say I don't understand their methods - especially when it comes to Nevada.  Now if I was allowed to consult with them to improve their program as I've offered to do for free repeatedly - then it might be different.  But I'm sure they have their reasons why they've instead chosen not to return my calls and hire someone to do training who got her initial recovery herself in a program that our program was part of their program.  Breaking Free is a residential program that has their clients participate in "Prostitutes Anonymous" meetings (as we were called prior to 1995).

http://www.gvnews.com/news/local/she-wants-a-better-life-for-victims/article_d59fce8e-484f-11e4-ab97-87323bfdee2f.html  Breaking Free ran "Prostitutes Anonymous" meetings (our program before the name change in 1995 to Sex Workers Anonymous" during the time Beth was a client there.














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